"(I bet if peacocks could fly his package would have been delivered by one of those.)"
Hee, now I'm imagining Lucius Malfoy spending his retirement trying to breed peacocks that can fly long distances. Hey, he's gotta do something now his political career's ended in disgrace. :)
"How come Harry knows so much about the different species of owls? He isn't knowledgeable about any other type of animal."
The H/D shipper in me says that he doesn't know about owls in general, he just knows a lot about Draco, and obsessively researches everything to do with the Malfoys, including their owl preferences.
"I can see how finding out for oneself how an unknown creature should be taken care of might be a suitable advanced project for NEWT-level students who have a lot of experience with a variety of familiar animals, but for students who have practically zero hand-on knowledge (thanks to the excellent teaching they got the previous year) this is completely inappropriate."
Yeah... the one redeeming feature in my eyes is the fact that Hagrid's incompetence is acknowledged in the text when the entire class drop COMC. A pity we didn't get more moments like this regarding other characters, really.
"Hermione counters him just to suck up to Hagrid."
To be fair to Hermione, I think this may have as much to do with disagreeing with Malfoy as it does with sucking up to Hagrid. I know I've got into arguments where I've advanced opinions, not because I think they're right, but because the other person was annoying me so much that I didn't want to agree with them. So yeah, a perfectly understandable reaction, IMHO, given how much they all hate Draco.
"Trelawney is, in a way, the Neville Longbottom of Divination. She is much more powerful than she believes or knows."
Yeah, it's weird how nobody seems to believe her, no matter how many times her predictions are proved right. Including Dumbledore, who doesn't seem to have much respect for Divination or make much effort to learn more about it, despite basing his entire strategy around one of Trelawney's prophecies. *facepalm*
"Draco is cowardly and scumming for attacking Harry from behind, as opposed to the twins at the end of this book who are gallant to attack Draco et al like that."
I forget who it was, but somebody said that JKR seems to view the scenes of the good guys fighting the bad guys less as playground fights and more as righteous punishment of the wicked. Which makes a certain amount of sense: so, for example, the good guys are never criticised for not fighting fair, just as nobody expects the police to give criminals a sporting chance to get away, whilst people get angry when criminals don't give their victims a chance to fight back (viz. people's reactions to gang beatings and the like). A similar dynamic seems to be at play here.
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timeasmymeasure
Part One
Date: 2011-03-26 05:21 pm (UTC)Hee, now I'm imagining Lucius Malfoy spending his retirement trying to breed peacocks that can fly long distances. Hey, he's gotta do something now his political career's ended in disgrace. :)
"How come Harry knows so much about the different species of owls? He isn't knowledgeable about any other type of animal."
The H/D shipper in me says that he doesn't know about owls in general, he just knows a lot about Draco, and obsessively researches everything to do with the Malfoys, including their owl preferences.
"I can see how finding out for oneself how an unknown creature should be taken care of might be a suitable advanced project for NEWT-level students who have a lot of experience with a variety of familiar animals, but for students who have practically zero hand-on knowledge (thanks to the excellent teaching they got the previous year) this is completely inappropriate."
Yeah... the one redeeming feature in my eyes is the fact that Hagrid's incompetence is acknowledged in the text when the entire class drop COMC. A pity we didn't get more moments like this regarding other characters, really.
"Hermione counters him just to suck up to Hagrid."
To be fair to Hermione, I think this may have as much to do with disagreeing with Malfoy as it does with sucking up to Hagrid. I know I've got into arguments where I've advanced opinions, not because I think they're right, but because the other person was annoying me so much that I didn't want to agree with them. So yeah, a perfectly understandable reaction, IMHO, given how much they all hate Draco.
"Trelawney is, in a way, the Neville Longbottom of Divination. She is much more powerful than she believes or knows."
Yeah, it's weird how nobody seems to believe her, no matter how many times her predictions are proved right. Including Dumbledore, who doesn't seem to have much respect for Divination or make much effort to learn more about it, despite basing his entire strategy around one of Trelawney's prophecies. *facepalm*
"Draco is cowardly and scumming for attacking Harry from behind, as opposed to the twins at the end of this book who are gallant to attack Draco et al like that."
I forget who it was, but somebody said that JKR seems to view the scenes of the good guys fighting the bad guys less as playground fights and more as righteous punishment of the wicked. Which makes a certain amount of sense: so, for example, the good guys are never criticised for not fighting fair, just as nobody expects the police to give criminals a sporting chance to get away, whilst people get angry when criminals don't give their victims a chance to fight back (viz. people's reactions to gang beatings and the like). A similar dynamic seems to be at play here.