Philosopher's Stone Chapter Five

[urbanman1984.livejournal.com]

Harry and Hagrid visit Diagon Alley and Harry meets Malfoy for the first time

Philosopher’s Stone Chapter Five

 

*The whole letter episode and bizarre chase must all have been a dream Harry.  So was you getting Dud’s second bedroom... no wait, there’s Hagrid to prove it’s all real.  Yay?

 

*Can someone tell me if the large balloon swelling inside Harry is supposed to have connotations?  We all know how keen JKR is on using disturbing imagery.  Could it possibly be some kind of womb metaphor?

 

*Harry is braver than I am, rooting through Hagrid’s coat.

 

*Yes, wizards have banks Harry and not just Swiss ones either.  Just feed Hagrid and be quiet.

 

*You would have to be mad to try and rob Gringotts - why?  Well... the top security vaults are guarded by a blind dragon that is scared of loud noises.  The other vaults have no real security it would seem.  One could just confund or imperius any goblin to get into them.

 

*Oh yes Hagrid, Dumblesnore trusts you all right... if by that you mean that you are so predictable that he has anticipated your every move and knows that you will unwittingly aid in his designs upon little Harry.

 

*Hagrid flew?  But only Voldemort can fly on his own with magic... oh dear maths continuity consistency with Quidditch through the Ages.

 

*Cover for Hagrid Harry.  No matter what happens.  It can’t possibly lead to trouble.  The Dursleys can just be left stranded on their rock and be returned to Privet Drive by a miracle/ plot hole.

 

*Everyone wanted Dumbledore for Minister of course... but Dumbledore refused because he already has all the positions in the magical world that hold any real power.  Minister for Magic is not one of those.  Dumbledore has all the positions that Voldemort was interested in and more besides. 

 

*The Ministry is supposed to keep from muggles that magic still exists.  If muggles knew there was still magic they would want magical solutions to their problems and we couldn’t have that.  It certainly makes nonsense of the uninspired Wizard and the Hopping Pot tale from Beedle the Bard.

 

*Hagrid shows disdain for everything muggle here as though he were a pureblood wizard.  Of course his pretending to be a pureblood is completely different from any half-blooded Death Eater pretending to be pure.  Hagrid isn’t even pure human, but he was sorted into Gryffindor.  What was the acronym...? IOIAGDI - It’s Okay If A Gryffindor Does It.  Dumblesnore’s pet has been trained to utterly reject his giant roots anyway.  I suppose JKR’s intended message from Hagrid’s storyline is to advocate culturalism (the idea that one culture is superior to all others) above racialism?

 

* Does anyone know at what point the pointed hats cease to be part of the Hogwarts uniform?  Did JKR just forget she included them here or did Hogwarts change its dress code to be more practical?

 

*Once again, I should emphasise that Hagrid’s disdain for muggles having to manage without magic is completely different from the Death Eaters disdain for muggles having to manage without magic.  IOIAGDI!

 

*There is a possible inconsistency here with the size of the Leaky Cauldron’s interior.  Tiny for a pub would be very small indeed, but in Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry, Hermione and the Weasleys all have a table to themselves for a meal.

 

*Once again, Dumbledore’s plot for Harry to feel no ties to any household or to the muggle world is evident.  Everyone greets Harry enthusiastically as soon as he enters the magical world.  Naturally it turns his head with the way it contrasts to the way he is received and treated by the Dursleys.

 

*Quirrell taught muggle studies at Hogwarts before he was Defence Against the Dark Arts master, but exactly when his year sabbatical was in relation to the date of his taking the Defence Against the Dark Arts position remains mysterious.  Fans have tried to analyse it, but they haven’t taken JKR’s individual type of maths into account, so they should expect to be surprised as they were with the matter of Bill and Charlie Weasley’s respective ages.

 

*Hagrid remembered how to get into Diagon Alley!  For the purposes of the plot he is more useful during this chapter than he is at any other point in the series.

 

*The newer UK editions have amended dragon liver “seventeen sickles an ounce” to “sixteen sickles an ounce” :p  The editors did catch this example of JKR’s intriguing adding up... eventually.

 

*The Gringotts poem is intimidating.  Never mess with a goblin... or they might not tell you that some artefact in a Gringotts vault is a fake when they possibly could.  And especially don’t look below their floors to steal or you might scare their blind old dragon.

 

*It’s more than Hagrid’s job is worth to tell Harry about the Philosopher’s Stone.  But not to tell some strange man in a pub all about it.  Really Quirrell should just have waited in the Leaky Cauldron till Hagrid came back for a drink and then offered to play cards for it with a dragon egg on the side.

 

*I expect a lot of fans besides me also wanted to know exactly how much was in Harry’s vault... but we all know better than to ask JKR any numeracy question!

 

*Great security measure Griphook.  Only a Gringotts goblin can open vault 713.  So what’s to stop someone imperiusing a Gringotts goblin to get round this security measure?  Nothing as we shall eventually find out.

 

*I infer that Madam Malkin doesn’t allow Hagrid into her shop.  Shows she has some sense.  Notice she doesn’t make a huge fuss of Harry being Harry Potter... Possibly this is just in the script.  If she had recognised him then so would Draco.  This is a possible turning point for an AU fanfic where Harry is in Slytherin. 

 

*It’s Draco’s misfortune that he reminded Harry of Dudley in this scene.  That is what really condemns him from Harry’s point of view.  It doesn’t matter whether or not Dud would be so self-effacing as to say; “I’ll bully father into getting me (a broom),” it is still enough for Draco to fit the Dud template in Harry’s mind. 

 

*It has been pointed out in responses to one of my other commentaries that Draco’s description of Hagrid as he presents it to Harry is the kind of gossip that boys like to hear about masters or other school staff.  If Draco had come up with compromising details about Professor Quirrell, Harry would certainly not have been indignant.  Draco could not know of course, that Hagrid has just been Dumblesnore’s unwitting pawn in introducing Harry to the magical world in such a way that Harry will be loyal to Dumbledore... and that Harry and Hagrid have perma-bonded as a result.

 

*For an eleven year old boy, Draco does do OK in reacting to the news that Harry is an orphan. 

 

*Draco’s repeating Lucius’ ideas about how muggleborn witches and wizards should be excluded from the magical community.  JKR’s view is that they should be accepted into the magical community as long as they treat muggles like vermin, the way the vast majority of half-bloods and pure-bloods do.  This is different from the Death Eater mindset. Marginally.  If you examine them both closely enough.

 

*Yes Hagrid, Malfoy would have been as ready to fawn over Harry as you are if he had known his name.  What is more I’m betting he would not expect Harry to keep covering up for him at the same time.  Oh well IOIAGDI.

 

*Hagrid nails the author’s mindset here with “look at yer mum!  Look what she had fer a sister!” It’s only muggles who are vermin, not muggleborns.  Clear?  Good.

 

*Indeed it is difficult to explain the rules of Quidditch given that they make no sense.  I suppose it could best be summed up by saying that only the Seeker matters at all.

 

*Here Hagrid fulfils his real mission regarding Harry.  Telling him that every single dark witch and wizard (not just Voldemort) came from Slytherin.  Dumblesnore could rely on Hagrid to tell Harry that of his own accord.  It is all crucial and sets in stone the mindset Harry will have for the rest of his life in the magical world.

 

*Harry is eager to find out how to curse Dudley.  It’s the one thing in the series that gives him the fervour to read the written word.  Strangely, the Dursleys are exempt from the usual rule that muggles can be brainwashed by anyone with magical powers without a second thought.  Compared to that, the use of Viridian’s type of curses seems really tame.

 

*JKR really over reached herself in assigning prices to the different items in the apothecary’s shop :p I suppose she thinks unicorn horns are actually cheaper than black beetle eyes.

 

* Hagrid gets Harry his first ever proper birthday present.  It is not sinister that Harry will be indefatigably loyal to Hagrid for years to come as a result of this day in Diagon Alley.  It is Dumblesnore’s ulterior motives and pulling the strings that is sinister.

 

*I can’t help but be uncomfortable on revisiting Ollivander after reading Deathly Hallows.  JKR has used the wand as a phallic image so much that I become unsettled when Ollivander starts going on about lengths and textures.  What on Earth was JKR thinking in both making the wand a penis metaphor and allowing female characters to use them?!

 

*It’s a free hamburger... hmm I should spare the Ronald McDonald joke from my commentary on chapter four. 

Comments

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

There's a priceless objective assessment of the sport of Quidditch by fanfic author Less Wrong in his story "Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality" here (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality) which I'll reproduce if you don't mind:

"What's Quidditch?"

Asking this was also a mistake.

"So let me get this straight," Harry said as it seemed that Ron's explanation (with associated hand gestures) was winding down. "Catching the Snitch is worth one hundred and fifty points?"

"Yeah -"

"How many ten-point goals does one side usually score not counting the Snitch?"

"Um, maybe fifteen or twenty in professional games -"

"That's just wrong. That violates every possible rule of game design. Look, the rest of this game sounds like it might make sense, sort of, for a sport I mean, but you're basically saying that catching the Snitch overwhelms almost any ordinary point spread. The two Seekers are up there flying around looking for the Snitch and usually not interacting with anyone else, spotting the Snitch first is going to be mostly luck -"

"It's not luck!" protested Ron. "You've got to keep your eyes moving in the right pattern -"

"That's not interactive, there's no back-and-forth with the other player and how much fun is it to watch someone incredibly good at moving their eyes? And then whichever Seeker gets lucky swoops in and grabs the Snitch and makes everyone else's work moot. It's like someone took a real game and grafted on this pointless extra position just so that you could be the Most Important Player without needing to really get involved or learn the rest of it. Who was the first Seeker, the King's idiot son who wanted to play Quidditch but couldn't understand the rules?" Actually, now that Harry thought about it, that seemed like a surprisingly good hypothesis. Put him on a broomstick and tell him to catch the shiny thing...

Ron's face pulled into a scowl. "If you don't like Quidditch, you don't have to make fun of it!"

"If you can't criticize, you can't optimize. I'm suggesting how to improve the game. And it's very simple. Get rid of the Snitch."

"They won't change the game just 'cause you say so!"

"I am the Boy-Who-Lived, you know. People will listen to me. And maybe if I can persuade them to change the game at Hogwarts, the innovation will spread."

A look of absolute horror was spreading over Ron's face. "But, but, but if you get rid of the Snitch, how will anyone know when the game ends?"

"Buy... a... clock. It would be a lot fairer than having the game sometimes end after ten minutes and sometimes not end for hours, and the schedule would be a lot more predictable for the spectators, too." Harry sighed.

Brilliant, isn't it? :-)

That bit about the 'pointless extra position just so [Harry] could be the Most Important Player' is spot-on!

The Seeker

[urbanman1984.livejournal.com]

That's a good hypothesis the fanfiction Harry made about the introduction of the Seeker. However, it was actually invented for the Boy Who Lived.

[pinkpolarity.livejournal.com]

I've got to read this thing now, this made me laugh out loud:

Who was the first Seeker, the King's idiot son who wanted to play Quidditch but couldn't understand the rules?" Actually, now that Harry thought about it, that seemed like a surprisingly good hypothesis. Put him on a broomstick and tell him to catch the shiny thing...

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

There are a couple of passages in the early chapters that made me 'laugh out loud' as I have not done for years. Truly, hilariously funny.

The story was getting updated at a rapid pace but seems to have stopped for the past fortnight; maybe the author has run out of steam. The tale was also diverging more and more from 'real Harry Potter' ... but I guess all fan fiction stories do that to some degree, so who am I to measure or criticise such? And also I gather the author does have some overall plan in mind, so I can't just assume he doesn't know where he's going.

It's still a very good and enjoyable read, even if at times there's such a gap between the story's lecturing on the scientific method and its Harry Potter foundation is so big you can fit a skyscraper through the middle. :-)

[detritius.livejournal.com]

Does this scene take place during PS canon, as Harry's just entering the wizarding world? Because no eleven year old in the history of anything ever talked like that.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

The story is most definitely an AU, with the change between it and canon happening long before Harry arrived at Hogwarts. Hence his knowledge of the 'methods of rationality' and his greater intellect.

I think the difference between this Harry and the real Harry - or this Harry and any eleven year old whose name isn't Albert Einstein or Richard Feynman - is a bit extreme, particularly as the story gets longer. But it's still a good read, even if only for the examination of the mechanics of Rowling's magic and for the overall cleverness.

And I think it's going to feature my OTP, so there's that as well!

[merrymelody.livejournal.com]

I dunno, there's that wonderful line Ron has somewhere in the later chapters of PS, where he's casually quoting medieval law.
(I'd look it up, but haven't got the books anymore! :/)

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

**It's like someone took a real game and grafted on this pointless extra position just so that you could be the Most Important Player without needing to really get involved or learn the rest of it. Who was the first Seeker, the King's idiot son who wanted to play Quidditch but couldn't understand the rules?**

Snape: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! *points at Harry and laughs so hard he cries*

That's perhaps the most perfect metaphor for the series I've ever encountered.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Actually, in 'Quidditch Through the Ages' it's made pretty clear that someone did exactly that.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

LOL! That passage is gold!

I remember being amazed now in OotP suddenly the Keeper was a really important position because Ron was playing it and Harry was out.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

I remember being amazed now in OotP suddenly the Keeper was a really important position because Ron was playing it and Harry was out.

But that bit of quidditch warping never quite worked for me, for just that reason; it was changing the whole "but Harry's position is the most important evah!" tenant of the game that had held for the previous four books. For that whole last part of the fifth book I honestly felt that Harry and Hermione were patronising Ron, that they'd grown somewhat apart from him (and thus contributing to the feeling that there was potential H/Hr there as well). Ron was left with his toys Keeping in the background - we never see the final game, do we? - while Harry and Hermione were off doing serious things.

I'm sort of surprised now to consider that we were supposed to take it any other way. It seemed clear to me in OotP that Ron and Quidditch were silly inconsequential elements of the story.

But then in HBP everything devolved into a morass of quidditch and high school 'romantic' hijinks much more in line with OotP!Quidditch!Ron, so there you go.

Quidditch and the king's idiot son

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

Baseball fan (and oh incidentally scientist) Stephen Jay Gould has a book (maybe Full House?) which discusses at length how as new technologies were invented for baseball bats, balls, etc, the mavens who made the official rules kept changing them to keep the game from getting boring by giving ALL the advantage to a reat pitcher/hitter/catcher/runner. If a good pitcher could win the game by himself, what would be the point of watching? There's only true suspense if all the individuals both have to stretch themselves to the utmost and work well together as a team.

So the rule-makers kept tweaking scoring, distance between the pitcher's mound & home, etc., to keep things balanced so there'd be real competition and one position couldn't decide the game....

If we took the Potterverse seriously enough to believe the structure of Quidditch had any meaning besides demonstrating JKR's inadequacies, what we have here is a game set up to allow any decent flier with good eyes and reflexes but who can outrageously outspend his rivals on sports equipment to determine the game absolutely. A game set up to present rich men's sons (Malfoy, Potter) as sports stars.

Re: Quidditch and the king's idiot son

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

what we have here is a game set up to allow any decent flier with good eyes and reflexes but who can outrageously outspend his rivals on sports equipment to determine the game absolutely.

Yes, I enjoyed that continual snarking about this in sistermagpie's PoA sporking. It was an outrageous situation that really exhibited Rowling's bias and hypocritical writing. Malfoy buying superior brooms for Slytherin is BAD. Sirius buying a superior broom for Harry is GOOD.

So the rule-makers kept tweaking scoring, distance between the pitcher's mound & home, etc., to keep things balanced so there'd be real competition and one position couldn't decide the game....

It's funny ... I still distinctly remember my astonishment when, as a boy, I was told that horse races are handicapped, with the better horses carrying greater weights. I'd naively assumed that it was just a simple case of the faster horse winning! :-)

Rowling's Quidditch *needs* that handicapping; otherwise it's just a two-horse race between the two seekers. :-)

[baeraad.livejournal.com]

I love this fic! I mean, I suppose that I'd love any fic that made rationality look cool, but it's actually really well written, too. All the characters have a lot more depth than JKR gave them, and they're still recognisably themselves - well, all of them except Harry, of course, but since the canon Harry has no discernible personality anyway, that's not much of a loss. ;)

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's a great story, isn't it?

Harry's a cipher, but Draco is *perfect* - raised beautifully as the son of a pureblood and Death Eater - and Hermione is great too.

Thanks for the note, it's good fun to talk about good fanfic!