PS Chapter Two

[hafl.livejournal.com]

- The manner in which Dursleys abuse Harry is so over the top, it is hard to take seriously.

- Harry can't understand why would Dudley want to get a bicycle, since he apparently hates sports and is fat. Clearly, Dudley is morally deficient.

- Harry's glasses are held together only by Scotch tape, because Dudley punches him into nose so often. In the previous paragraph, it was stated that Harry is so fast, Dudley can't often catch him. These two sentences don't mesh together well.

- Not only is Harry not afraid of spiders, but also likes his scar. A true Gryffindor.

- Dudley is so fat he is like a pig. Hahaha, fat people are pathetic. Unless they're matronly of course.

- Okay, Dudley has no trouble while counting his gifts one by one, but when he has to add two at once, he is suddenly having problems?

- Harry find it hard to feel sorry that Mrs. Figg has broken her leg. The power of love at work, ladies and gentlemen.

- Petunia "looking furiously at Harry as though he'd planned this" is actually pretty interesting. If I remember Deathly Hallows correctly, Snape had some measure of control over his magic even before he entered Hogwarts and Petunia knew about it. As far as she knows, Harry may have caused Mrs. Figg to break her leg.

- Dudley is so spoiled he knows he only needs to pretend to cry to get all he wants.

- Again, Vernon warns Harry about doing anything weird. This and all the accounts of Harry's mishaps really reinforces the idea that the Dursleys are scared of Harry and think he is in control of his magic.

- Now that's Harry's school is mentioned, how come nobody noticed him being abused by the Dursleys? I don't mean classmates, I mean the school administration. They should know that both Harry and Dudley have the same address and they should know that Dursleys are Harry's legal guardians. Why didn't anyone the teachers notice that Harry's probably malnourished, wears only old clothes and his glasses are constantly getting broken, while Dudley's fat and owns only new things? I don't know that much about British educational system, especially in the eighties, but it probably wasn't that bad.

- In the zoo, Harry feels compassionate towards the snake. At this point, he's still a sympathetic kid.

- Now, after the snake incident, Piers claims that Harry was talking to the snake. Okay, but Parseltongue is apparently just hissing. So is Piers saying that Harry was talking just a simplification to avoid the revelation that Parseltongue is hissing? Or, if Harry was using human speech, why did the snake understand him?

- The Dursleys reaction is actually completely understandable. From their point of view, Harry was using is magic and from all the incidents that were mentioned, this one is the only one, where Dursleys could reasonably think that Harry was trying to attack them.

- And at the end of the chapter, we are again reminded that Harry is lonely and abused and that there's something mysterious about him.

Comments

[oryx_leucoryx]

No, the first time a family of a Muggle-born magical child would hear from the wizarding establishment was when someone from Hogwarts came with the letter. The Evanses hadn't had any such contact by the time Severus was spying on Lily.

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

Oh yes. Silly me.

Still, I think that seeing them when their child is born would be a good idea, in order to stop any of the abuse mentioned above.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Unless, of course, the Ministry (in keeping with Ron's comment that wizards have had to rely on Muggleborns and halfbloods to keep the population from dying out) is seeking to keep every wizard closely tied to the WW, and is desperate/idiotic/inhumane enough to figure that having Muggleborns grow up to distrust or dislike Muggles is a good way of shaping their future allegiances. We've yet to hear of a Muggle family being permitted to keep their Muggleborn child out of Hogwarts, and we know that the Ministry can *monitor* magical children in the Muggle world. We've also yet to hear of a Muggleborn *not* throwing the Muggle world over completely for the WW. What's to stop the Ministry from pulling a Dumbledore?

Pure speculation, and not a very nice idea, but it's not exactly out of tune with what JKR showed us.