COS Chapter Five: "The Whomping Willow"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

 

* Harry spends six weeks of the school holidays at the Dursleys’ house, and for the rest of the year he’s a massive celebrity who can basically do whatever he likes because of something that he can’t remember and had nothing to do with. Doesn’t sound to me like he’s got much reason to be jealous of Ron.

* Is the fact that dinner contains all Harry’s favourite things a coincidence, or did Mrs. Weasley deliberately design it that way? If so, is she already trying to snare Harry in order to get her hands on some of his money? *Grins at the thought of MoneyGrubbing!Molly*

* Somehow I can’t imagine the Malfoys being so disorganised.

* “Muggles do know more than we given them credit for, don’t they?” says Mrs. Weasley, the big joke being that they don’t, it’s all magic. Wizards rule!

* The Weasley parents let Fred and George take fireworks to school? Christ, it’s no wonder they’re so badly-behaved.

* Also, couldn’t they just take the kids to the station, then later mail them the things they’ve left behind?

* Still, the foreshadowing of Ginny’s diary is nicely done, though, so I forgive JKR for this minor plot hole.

* Is it really necessary to run into the barrier? Surely standing casually near it and then slipping through when nobody’s looking would be less likely to attract attention.

* Yes, Ron, of course all those grown-up, fully-qualified wizards on Platform 9 ¾ aren’t going to be able to figure a way of getting back. *rolls eyes*

* “The Dursleys haven’t given me pocket money in about six years,” says Harry, implying that they did until he was six years old. I wonder what he bought then that made them decide he couldn’t be trusted with his own money?

* That flying car plan has got to rate as one of the stupidest in the books, and as you can imagine, it’s up against some stiff competition.

* If Harry and Ron had really become invisible, they’d be blind, although to be fair to JKR this little problem with the laws of physics isn’t exactly unique to her.

* The description of the car flying above the clouds is good. Really brings out the wonderment Harry and Ron must be feeling.

* Any guesses as to which city they’re seeing? I was thinking it might be Birmingham or Manchester or somewhere like that, but the “wide, purplish moors” would seem to imply that they’re further north than that.

* Pumpkins aren’t particularly juicy, so it must take a lot to get enough for the whole school to drink. I can’t imagine why wizards drink pumpkin as opposed to, say, orange or apple juice.

* An impact hard enough to raise a golf-ball-sized lump on someone’s head would knock most people out, but Harry is a Gryffindor, and therefore above trivial injuries such as concussion.

* Wonder if there’s meant to be any Freudian symbolism in Ron having a broken wand? :p

* I probably shouldn’t ask why charming a car to make it fly would make it gain sentience.

* Harry looks through the window into the Great Hall, and the reader is treated to a rare sighting of the elusive Hogwarts school hat.

* Now I'm imagining watching a Springwatch-type programme set in Hogwarts, where the presenters set up hidden cameras around the school in the hope of getting a glimpse of one of the school hats.

* “For a few horrible seconds”, Harry had worried that he’d be put in Slytherin. One of the clearest indications in the books that we’re meant to think of being put in Slytherin as a sign of great evil.

* Harry seems to show a remarkable knowledge of colours here. I doubt I’d be able to recognise aquamarine when I saw it.

* The narrative voice pauses to bitch about how “everyone” hates Snape for a few sentences, inexplicably omitting to mention that he saved Harry’s life last year.

* BTW, I highly doubt that Snape was disliked by “everyone outside of his own house (Slytherin)”. In my experience, children tend to quite like the sarcastic teachers.

* Unless by “everyone” Jo means “everyone who matters”, i.e., Harry, Ron and Hermione.

* Snape’s suddenly appearing behind them like that is pretty funny.

* So how is it that the Evening Prophet can interview these Muggles, write the story, print the paper, and send it up to Scotland in less time than it takes Harry and Ron to fly directly from London to Hogwarts? If I were doing Jabootu scores, this would definitely be a case of offscreen teleportation.

* Why would someone travelling from London to Scotland go via Norfolk? Do wizards just like the countryside there?

* Harry hasn’t thought of what effect his stupid actions will have on others. Well, colour me shocked!

* No idea what the “large, slimy something suspended in green liquid” is there for. Probably to add to the atmosphere.

* I’m surprised McGonagall is so angry. One would have thought that, as a Gryffindor, she’d prize reckless action without any thought.

* Harry told the story as if he and Ron just happened to find a flying car, making them look like a pair of criminals as well as a pair of idiots, and continuing in the long tradition of lying to save the arses of adults who really should know better.

* Harry’s being worried about Gryffindor losing points is rather sweet. It’d be interesting to see how the hourglasses in the Great Hall show Gryffindor being on negative points, though.

* One detention each sounds like a pretty inadequate punishment, TBH.

* Is it possible to conjure up food out of thin air, then? If so, wizards could pretty much solve world hunger without any problems at all. That they don’t makes them look rather selfish and insular.

* “Breaking the law? Cool!” Seems Twinkly’s favouritism has given the Gryffindors something of an entitlement complex when it comes to breaking rules. At least Percy and Hermione have the right idea.

* If there are only five second-year Gryffindor boys, and the same amount of girls, and this number is about right for every House and every year, then there would only be 280 children in Hogwarts in total. Which would seem to contradict slightly the description of Hogwarts as a huge castle, or the dining hall as larger than the Dursleys’ house. Oh dear maths/architecture/consistency/worldbuilding…

* Meanwhile, Draco Malfoy goes to sleep in the Slytherin dorms, muttering, “Stupid Potter with his stupid broomstick and his stupid flying car and his stupid ginger boyfriend, he can do literally anything and get away with just a detention.” Little does he realise that he will be proved right in Year 6, after a certain incident in the bathrooms.

 

Comments

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Good points. What's the difference between conjuring a live canary and a dead chicken? Or the difference between the vegetable matter in edible plants and a piece of wood? (And we'll just politely avert our eyes and pretend that they weren't conjuring food during the Camping Trip From Hell.)

Also, don't the birds and snakes violate Gamp's law regarding creating life? Unless they are merely imported from elsewhere, as-is...so why can't you import a chicken!? And we see students transfigure animals into non-living things and then revert them back to living things. Doesn't that violate Gamp's law? Unless there's some sort of magic way to put that existing life-force in some magic 'life storage' until needed...(yes, I've read "Out of the Bag")...but then why can't you transfigure a lot of animals into bits of wood and use their life-force to resurrect your dead loved one?

Really, I think JKR simply DIDN'T THINK THINGS THROUGH. Yet again. However, my preferred Watsonian explanation, expanding upon Jodel's theory that wizardry is just a domesticated version of magic that was once all wild (i.e. dark), is that Gamp's Law and all those other laws we hear about are just laws of what is possible within WIZARDRY, and that seeming violations of them are really just unacknowledged dark or semi-dark (i.e. less domesticated) magic, which allows for a greater range of things.

Organic chemistry

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

Antoine de LeVoisier, the Father of Modern (especially Organic) Chemistry, was a wizard who worked (at the time of Separation) in both worlds, I am convinced.

It's a great pity the Terror killed him when he was merely in his forties; I'm sure his Principles would have elucidated all of C's questions, and many more.

Magically, the difference between a live bird and a dead one is immensely significant; chemically, the difference is much less, amounting to whether certain enzymes are still being actively produced.

However, the difference that matters is that between an apparition which needs to fool one's mind and one which needs to fool one's body. Is one conjuring a REAL bird, or something that seems like one?

If it's only the latter, apparent inconsistencies dissolve. One hasn't made a REAL live bird, only a simulacrum wwhich appears and acts like one. If the simulacrum were "killed," it might even taste like fowl-but not react chemically like fowl. Similarly, transfiguring wood into an apple might affect the surface senses--it might look, feel, and smell like an apple.

But it wouldn't nourish the body as an apple (or dead bird) would, because the original spell didn't create down to the molecular level of complexity.