PS Chapter Five

[hafl.livejournal.com]

First, sorry that I've stopped doing these, I just have been very busy for the last several months.



- Harry thinking that Hagrid telling him he's a wizard is a nice touch. However, it is immediately spoiled by the fact he mistakes, an owl knocking with its claw on a presumably glass window for aunt Petunia knocking on wooden door with her fist.

- Hagrid apparently still doesn't get that Harry doesn't know anything about the wizarding world. However, he finds time to brag that Dumbledore sends to do important tasks, including picking up Harry. Got to keep feeding Harry's ego.

- Harry, being surprised that wizards have banking system is one thing, but being surprised that they have the means to fly?

- Anyway, how did Hagrid fly to the island? He has no broom or flying motorcycle, the thestrals haven't been invented yet, so what means did he use? And if it is possible to fly without any tools, why is it such a big deal when Voldemort does it in book seven.

- Hagrid mentions that there are dragons at Gringotts. I wonder, if Rowling remembered that, when writing book seven.

- Daily Prophet mentions the Ministry of Magic messing up. Does it side with the Ministry in book five, because the journalists also don't want to believe that Voldemort has returned. And by the way, why there wasn't more newspaper coverage of the Triwizard tournament, when it was supposed to be a big and important event?

- I think that Fudge is fairly competent at running the Ministry and Hagrid exagerrates the amount of help he wants from Dumbledore. Though Dumbledore certainly doesn't seem too busy running the school.

- Oh, it would be horrible, if Muggles asked wizards for solutions to problems. It doesn't matter that technology can do almost anything the wizards can do and do it better. People, who ask for help by magical means are clearly unworthy of receiving any help.

- The list of things necessary for Hogwarts is actually quite weird. For example, there is no textbook for Astronomy, which is something that would be probably very useful. It also shows that there really aren't any actual cultural subjects at Hogwarts, further cementing that the Wizarding world is a cultural void. Except for one band, one comic book and one book of fairy tales.

- Oh, and apparently, underwear is voluntary at Hogwarts. Not to mention that having only one hat and one winter cloak for the entire year is extremely stupid, what if it gets torn or destroyed in other way? Not to mention that potions apparently have a habit of exploding. The house elves must be really good at mending clothes. (God forbid that the students mend their clothes by themselves, like in any proper school story.)

- Hagrid can't see how Muggles can live without magic while climbing a broken-down escalator. I don't know, a broken escalator is just like the stairs at Hogwarts, except it stays in one place and is therefore better. A functioning escalator is also better than the stairs at Hogwarts.

- Oh yes, Harry. It is perfectly okay to trust a strange, large, hairy man who wants you to take into a pub.

- Why does everyone recognise Harry, when the last time he was in the Wizarding world was when he was a baby? Is there a special section in the Daily Prophet entitled "The Growth of Harry Potter, Day By Day" with a reporter dedicated only to stalking Harry as he grows up? If there is, that guy must be really disappointed on losing that job now that Harry's going to Hogwarts.

- Quirell got possesed by Voldemort after he decided to leave Britain. That's where all the evil lies, outside Britain.

- Why must there be a magical entrance from magical pub to magical street? It isn't needed, apparently only wizards can see the Leaking Cauldron.

- How does a Self-Stirring cauldron work? Do you just input the number of stirring and the direction?

- The description of goblins seems like a vaguely racist caricature to me, but that might be just my imagination.

- No wonder that wizards value bravery so high, when a bad poem engraved on bank door scares Hagrid.

- Having a key is the only identification needed to access a vault at Gringotts. You'd be mad to try and rob the place, when you can just steal the key from its owner and then walk into the bank and take what you want. Great security system, right there.

- ...a pile of rubies as big as glowing coals. Just how are glowing coals a unit for measuring size. Brightness, sure, but I don't think that glowing coals have any specific standard size.

- Harry has a lot of money, yet he still counts as working class by the end of the series, when he has to work for a living.

- The wizarding monetary system makes no sense. Seventeen and twenty-nine are both prime numbers, that does not make them a good number to set an exchange rate of coins. What's wrong with decimal exchange rate? Or, if Rowling wanted the exchange rates to be still a bit unfamiliar to kids, it could have been based on twelves.

- There's no mention of an uniform in the school supply list, but Hagrid tells Harry to et one at Madam Malkin's. Plain black work robes are a sensible clothing choice, but it does not really set Hogwarts students apart as a separate group, which is one of the purposes of a uniform. The movies did much better in that respect.

- I'm not really surprised by Harry disliking Draco at their first encounter. Draco does resemeble Dudley in this scene a bit: Parents do his shopping for him and he plans to make them buy him a broom. Of course, knowing Lucius, he won't let Draco "bully" him into doing anything, if Draco doesn't deserve it, but Harry has no way of knowing that.

- Draco talking to Harry about Quidditch, when Harry is obviously dressed in Muggle clothes, may seem a bit strange, but for all Draco knows, Harry might have put on the clothes just because Harry's presumed parents did not want to stand out in Muggle London.

- Given how much pressure is put on the wizarding kids to be in the "right" house, I totally understand Draco's distaste for being in Hufflepuff.

- Sorry Harry, a gamekeeper is sort of a servant. Also everything else Draco says about Hagrid is true, except maybe for setting fire to his bed, but that's believable.

- Draco doesn't sound sorry, when he says he's sorry, that parents of an unfriendly boy he had just met are dead. He's clearly evil incarnate!

- That reminds me, the last time I saw an irredeemably evil kid in a book for children, the kid was savagely beaten by her classmates with teacher's knowledge and the author later during the war went to write a book about brave German soldiers fighting brutal British partisans.

- Oh, the irony! Harry didn't know about Hogwarts until he got the letter, even though his parents were a witch and wizard. Though Draco is worried about completely inconsequential problems, after all, every single Muggleborn that goes to Hogwarts winds up either dead or thoroughly assimilated.

- See, even Hagrid thinks Hufflepuff is worthless, but at least it's not evil like Slytherin.

- As a side note, the Czech translation for Slytherin "Zmijozel" is the most unsubtle thing evere. It pretty much means "viper's evil".

- Hagrid must have known that Sirius was a bad wizard, who didn't go to Slytherin, but he probably thought that Sirius was "Sorted too soon".

- ...few books with nothing in them at all. Even Dudley, who never read anything, would have been wild to get his hands on some of these. Nice juxtaposition there, JKR.

- Oh great, the only thing that stops wizards from cursing Muggles, who deserve it, is that wizards are not supposed to use magic in the Muggle world.

- And the chapter contradicts itself. Hagrid and Harry are buying potion supplies, even though the school list doesn't mention them at all. Would Hagrid have enough foresight to buy them for Harry, knowing that Snape would probably punish Harry for not having the supplies, he doesn't need to have according to the list.

- Of course Harry gets an owl, the best pet to have. Harry must always have the best, even if it's mostly so that he can ignore it and therefore look modest.

- Ollivander saying that it's the wand that chooses the wizard is the only foreshadowing we get for that entire Elder Wand business.

- From what Ollivander says, willow wands are good for charms and mahogany wands are good for transfigurations.

- Lily's wand was ten and a quarter inches long. James' wand was eleven inches and had a little more power. Voldemort's wand was thirteen-and-a-half inches and it was very powerful. Who says that size doesn't matter?

- However, Hagrid must have been a super wizard with his sixteen inches.

- Harry's wand is eleven inches, just like his father's.

- Harry actually sounds worried of not living up to the expectations his fame has created and admits that he doesn't deserve that fame. Don't worry, we'll get that out of him soon enough.

Comments

[sunnyskywalker]

Maybe Hagrid Portkeyed to the island? If so, though, it seems silly not to have given him one with a return trip programmed in. Plus JKR hadn't invented Porkeys yet.

What do they do in all those years of Astronomy, anyway? Make charts and nothing else? Since they don't have a textbook.

The odd thing about the Daily Prophet article is that this is Fudge's first year in office. Usually it's the other way around - the big criticism comes later, after they're sure you're not the new and better politician they'd been hoping for when they picked you. Although perhaps the DP leans toward the opposition party, whatever that might be (and how unfair that they only have the one major newspaper, in that case).

Yeah, Draco seems a bit bratty here, but not irredeemably so. He's the kind of character you'd expect to get a few shocks about how the real world works in the first year or two and start shaping up. Or if he didn't, to get significantly more evil so that his later dilemma over whether he's a murderer or not would be about more than just protecting his family. As it is, he's mostly talk for the next five books, and not much of that even (some of his pointed comments about Hagrid's class being dangerous are just true, not evil, and there's bits like in GoF how he warns Hermione at the World Cup instead of, say, trying to cause any new trouble for her in any way).

That's fascinating about the Czech translation! I wonder why they didn't go with something that sounded like the Czech word for "slither," if that was a possibility? Does JKR get much input on these decisions?

[hafl.livejournal.com]

The entire encounter with Draco is written in a tone that seem designed to make reader dislike him right from the start, even if the worst thing he's done is saying some nasty, but true, things about Hagrid and brag about his parents. That hardly says evil to me.

The translator might have used the Czech word for slither, but I can't think of any way of using it that would sound even remotely well written. I've read some interview with the translator and he mentioned, that he had consulted translation of some names with JKR, mostly the names that contained puns or references, so she clearly had some input there.

[sunnyskywalker]

Draco: the Diet Coke of evil.

That's what I wondered, whether it would sound okay in Czech or just silly. It still seems like there ought to be other options besides "viper's evil" (snake den? cunning house? I have no idea what would sound good) but if that was through JKR's input... sigh.

Dumbledore's job.

[nx74defiant.livejournal.com]

"Though Dumbledore certainly doesn't seem too busy running the school."

How much does Dumbledore actually do? Minerva seems to handle a lot - the letters, the sorting. I got the impression that a lot of the day to day work of the school was under her care. Dumbledore hires a new Defense teacher every year. (and such a wonderful job he does at that), the other positions have almost no turnover. Dumbledore gives a speech at the beginning and end. He appears at meals. If a student wants to see him they have to be given a password - no office hours in the wizarding world

Re: Dumbledore's job.

[sunnyskywalker]

He doesn't seem to do much policy-making, since it looks like not much has changed since about the 1940s (or earlier) when he got Horcrux books banned, he pretty much lets the teachers do whatever, and there don't seem to be any issues about who is or isn't in the school's "district." He might have to respond to the occasional angry parent petition not to let Muggleborns into the school, but we don't hear that that is a common occurrence, which you'd think would be hard to miss if it were. Maybe he spends all his time managing the school's endowment? (They must have some sort of funding, and if you can donate to St. Mungo's, why not Hogwarts?)

Re: Dumbledore's job.

[oryx_leucoryx]

He might have to respond to the occasional angry parent petition not to let Muggleborns into the school, but we don't hear that that is a common occurrence, which you'd think would be hard to miss if it were.

In GOF chapter 24 Albus claims that he receives weekly complaints about how he runs the school. He does not say whether he responds in any way.

I think the house-elves answer to him so he might direct them on occasion. But it seems most of what he does is run plots against the villain of the year.

Re: Dumbledore's job.

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

In GOF chapter 24 Albus claims that he receives weekly complaints about how he runs the school. He does not say whether he responds in any way.


Given how at least one-third of the faculty at any time are either evil, imprisoned, werewolves, impostors, insane, incompetent or sadistic, I'm surprised he doesn't et more complaints.

Re: Dumbledore's job.

[sunnyskywalker]

If you add up all the possible reasons to complain about his management generally, once a week doesn't sound often enough! Maybe he has an auto-quill to send form replies at regular intervals so he doesn't have to bother with that tedious "personal touch" bit of running a school. More likely he just finds them amusing reading, though.

Re: Dumbledore's job.

[nx74defiant.livejournal.com]

You put a big smile on my face.

I just picture Dumbledore reading his mail and laughing at these silly parents thinking things like competent teaching and protecting their children matter.

Re: Dumbledore's job.

[hafl.livejournal.com]

I think that Dumbledore being mostly absent from the school is just something that had remained from the school story influence in Harry Potter. In those, the headmaster is supposed to be an aloof, but almost all-knowing figure, who only appears at the beginning to deliver a speech about the school's aims and morals and after that only when something goes terribly wrong. I have some mini-rants about how Rowling butchers story conventions of the school story prepared and I'll probably talk more about that there.

[hafl.livejournal.com]

I'd cut JK some slack here. IIRC astronomy is taught once a month and is not considered exactlly the most important subject. Maybe the kids just borrow astronomy books, maps etc. from the library when they need them, and study from the notes they make in class?

You're probably right. Anyway, the Astronomy class probably exists to have a reason for Hogwarts to have an exceptionally tall tower for plot purposes.

If having his parents help him with shopping school supplies, bragging, and longing for fancy toys is what it takes for a kid to resemble Dudley, then every single child of Draco's age I know resembles Dudley. :)

I think that when he says he's going to "bully" them into doing something, he crosses the line between normal kid and spoiled brat.

The tell-tale scar? Most wizarding folks knew about it, right?

Petunia made Harry hide his scar under his hair, though. But since he didn't comb his hair that morning, that might explain it. Draco didn't recognise him, though.

Actually, I think this was a parody of non-decimal systems - there were 13 shillings to a pound at one point, after all.

You're right, I didn't think of that.

While Slytherin is subtlety incarnate.

Slytherin, while sounding unpleasant, does not scream evil into your face.

But yeah, the translation sucks where puns are concerned.

To be fair, most translations do.

Lost in translation

[urbanman1984.livejournal.com]

There are a lot of puns in HP so the translators have to be creative to make substitutes. How did the dutch translator construe Voldemort's real name?

'Dooddoener'? It conveys what pathetic, non-threatening villains they were. A better alternative in English for 'Death doers' would be something like 'corpse makers.'

Re: Lost in translation

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

Very sneaky move on the Dutch translator's part! XD That's neat.

In German, Tom Riddle is Tom Riddle and Lord Voldemort is Lord Voldemort. I don't have the second or sixth books, so I don't know if his middle name is also the same.

In French, Tom Riddle is Tom Jedusor and his middle name, funnily enough, is Elvis. I remember cracking up when I first read it. But I guess that the French translator also had to find a way to make his name an anagram of "Je suis Voldemort" (I am Voldemort).

In Greek, Voldemort's name is the same, but is spelled Βόλντεμορτ. Tom Riddle's name is changed to Άντον Μόρβολ Χερτ (Anton Morvol Khert) for the sake of the anagram, even though he's sometimes called Toμ (Tom). But here's where things get weird.

Whenever Voldemort is referred to as "Lord Voldemort" in the text, he's called "ο λόρδος Βόλντεμορτ" (o lorthos Voldemort), "lorthos" being a modern Greek term for "lord."

But while Tom Riddle's full name in Greek (Anton Morvol Khert) does turn into "Lord Voldemort," it uses a variation of the Ancient Greek word for "lord." Άντον Μόρβολ Χερτ (Anton Morvol Khert) becomes Άρχον Βόλντεμορτ (Arkhon Voldemort). Technically, the word άρχων ("arkhon" with a long 'o') is the Ancient Greek word for "ruler, noble, magistrate, lord," but I guess that the translator had to fit the words in somehow.

Re: Lost in translation

[urbanman1984.livejournal.com]

In German he was Tom Vorlost Riddle. "Ist Lord Voldemort"

[oryx_leucoryx]

what the heck does it have to do with Hermione Granger?

It relates to her otter Patronus.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Rowling does use names to describe character (Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle = grab and coil, Severus, Minerva, Alastor etc), so it is legitimate to use the same means for other characters.

Hermione's name is a Shakespearean allusion - and its supposed to show she comes from a cultured background. The specific allusion is also related to Hermione's petrification in 2nd year. It is legitimate to have her name imply she is scholarly in other ways if the translator is already translating names.

[sunnyskywalker]

Catching the mood and social status of a name rather than translating it literally makes sense to me - I'm not fluent in any other languages, but have had enough instruction in a few to get the part where translating properly doesn't always mean translating literally. (Did you know Plato's Meno is full of really bad puns? (Probably the others too, but that's the one we translated in class.) That does not come through in any translation I've read, which is a shame.)

"Griffel" also has the advantage of looking a bit like "griffin." I don't know how they translated "Gryffindor," but it at least makes a nice allusion to her House when you send it back to the English speakers. So bilingual readers can enjoy it.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

That's very interesting. I've always found translation to be fascinating because you never know how faithful the translation is going to be and whether or not the translator will have to go about it creatively, as the Dutch translator did, in order to preserve the spirit of the original language or to make the text more comprehensible to foreign readers.

[hafl.livejournal.com]

I have read cheap fantasy published in early nineties and early localised video games, so I've seen a lot of translations worse than these. It's just that names are the easiest point of comparison and very hard to translate well.

[oryx_leucoryx]

As far as I know the Hebrew translation left personal names and place names unchanged (except possibly Tom Marvolo Riddle) though did come up with some punny terminology. So the House names are probably as the original as they are named after people. However some 3 generations ago there was a trend of translating character names (so Othello became 'Ithiel Hakushi' - Ithiel the Kushite' and Romeo and Juliet might be 'Ram and Yael'). So if one tried that the natural translation of Slytherin would be the name 'Nahshon', a real name that means 'little snake'. However Nahshon in the exodus story was the prince of the tribe of Judah and in tradition was the first to jump into the Red Sea as Moses was parting it. So the name is considered a symbol of bravery and leadership.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Actually, I think this was a parody of non-decimal systems - there were 13 shillings to a pound at one point, after all.


Isn't Rowling a member in some movement that wants to preserve the non-metric units in the name of tradition? I have a recollection of reading a tidbit about it once.

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

No, she's pro-JK. She likes Labour because they wanted to more benefits to single mothers.

[aasaylva.livejournal.com]

I read about her supporting the movement about old metric systems as well. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me because her whole WW nostalgia screams "ye old English way" like any Agatha Christie does. Being Labour is being chic and progressive, I suppose. Somewhat like the Wealeays, in fact. Lip service towards the liberal side, real beliefs to the contrary.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

>Why does everyone recognise Harry, when the last time he was in the Wizarding world was when he was a baby?
The tell-tale scar? Most wizarding folks knew about it, right? <

And why would they know about the scar? No one in the WW ever saw it but Hagrid, Minerva, and Albus. Did Hagrid get drunk at the Hog's Head one evening and spout the information to all and sundry? Did Albus give a press conference to make sure that his potential pawn would be recognized and pushed into his appointed role? Somehow I can't see Minerva as the leak.

13 shillings to a guinea. One shilling more than a pound. Tradesmen were paid in pounds. Artists were paid in guineas.

[lissa2.livejournal.com]

So that's another thing JKR didn't think through...btw the cat lady neighbor (I forgot her name) probably knew about the scar too.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Yes, Arabella Figg would have certainly known about the scar, but she doesn't seem to really have been all that connected to what was going on in the ww, even if she did have a nice sideline business breeding cat/kneezle crosses (and why didn't Harry ever notice that some of her cats looked decidedly *odd*?)

[kaizopp.livejournal.com]

Oh, man. The first time I read the Draco scene, I was like "Dude, I like that kid!" Clearly, I was doing it wrong from the start.

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

And I found it awfully cute that Draco talked to Harry so easily. Harry looks like a ragamuffin at that point, and Draco, the well-groomed rich kid, just starts to talk to him and approaches him like an equal, asking questions about what House he'll think he'll be in, and about Quidditch.. Things that any other wizarding boy would be interested in. Draco is amazingly willing to believe that this odd-looking, unknown boy was just like himself.

Yeah, he didn't ask about Harry's blood status, family, social status, money, or even his name, i.e., any of that stuff the "evil, bigoted Slytherins" are supposed to care so much about. Why, for all Draco knew, this new kid could have been a *gasp* Mudblood! The way Harry was dressed certainly suggested a background that was not just non-magical but also poor. The ones who got hung up on *OMG! It's Harry Potter!* were the supposedly non-bigoted Weasleys.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

Well, after Harry and Draco get into bit of an argument about Hagrid, Draco does ask if Harry's parents were "our kind." After Harry says that they were a witch and wizard, Draco then says the sort of people who don't "know our ways" shouldn't be allowed in. So, he does demonstrate prejudice there.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Yes, but only after all his attempts to communicate with Harry failed. You see, Draco was questioning the prejudices he knew from home, and Harry just confirmed them.

[kahran042]

You and me both, my friend. You and me both.

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

- Oh, it would be horrible, if Muggles asked wizards for solutions to problems. It doesn't matter that technology can do almost anything the wizards can do and do it better. People, who ask for help by magical means are clearly unworthy of receiving any help.

Oh, exactly. Hello, Wizarding World? Every single superhero wants a word with you. Spider-Man's especially furious.

Seventeen and twenty-nine are both prime numbers, that does not make them a good number to set an exchange rate of coins.

The closest they come to mathematics is learning about the magical properties of certain numbers. Which, to be fair, if written by an actual number theorist could be quite fascinating. (Similar statements could be made about a lot of the series, of course.)

black work robes are a sensible clothing choice, but it does not really set Hogwarts students apart as a separate group, which is one of the purposes of a uniform.

I don't know, it does have a somewhat monastic air about it, which fits well with Hogwarts being founded in the Middle Ages (one suspects the uniform has not changed since the Founders' day).

Though Draco is worried about completely inconsequential problems, after all, every single Muggleborn that goes to Hogwarts winds up either dead or thoroughly assimilated.

This does raise questions about magical/Muggle pairings - how can they function in the long term?

[oryx_leucoryx]

This does raise questions about magical/Muggle pairings - how can they function in the long term?

They probably don't. Tom Sr returned to his parents, Dean's dad walked out. Seamus' dad wasn't heard from since chapter 7 of PS (though his mother pops up now and then). Not sure what happened to the Snapes - the parents were living together when Severus and Lily were talking but only Eileen is at the train station (while Lily's family is all there, so it's not a matter of the barrier).

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

And Cho married a Muggle, didn't she? (According to interview-canon, anyway). Such is the unhappy fate of any who do not please the great Harry Potter.

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

Muggle or not, he was probably still a more pleasant spouse than Harry would have been.

[kahran042]

How do we know that the Muggle in question was a he? ;)

[wolf-willow31.livejournal.com]

Spider-Man's especially furious.

As he should be! If you compare Harry Potter and Peter Parker, the original Spider-Man stories come off much better than HP. Peter looks a lot like Harry, with his glasses and curly black hair, but after his laziness and self-involvement result in the death of his uncle, he starts to grow up and try to take responsibility. He studies hard at school, he tries to take care of his aunt (he's an orphan, too), and he works hard to defeat older, more powerful villains, even when it seems hopeless. He keeps trying and never gives up, despite the endless setbacks that the authors (I'm talking about Stan Lee and Steve Ditko here) created for him. They were only throw-away, 15-cent comic books, but Peter Parker was a very good role model. Harry, on the other hand, makes one cringe. (And they say comic books are bad for you!).

[sunnyskywalker]

I always pictured the robes as looking something like this, with the plain ones for students and fancier ones for teachers (and pointy hats instead of flat ones, when the hats aren't playing now-you-see-them-now-you-don't). Traditional academic dress, more or less.

(Which reminds me of a graduation I was at where one speaker was a man from the local Native American nation in ceremonial dress. Some old guy in the audience quietly asked how much "stone age" culture we should "let these people" keep - while looking at a room full of kids in funny robes and hats based on what students wore a thousand years ago. Which actually made the Native speaker's outfit more modern in inspiration. Audience Guy would have made a great wizard.)

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

Academic gowns are worn over other clothes, though, and it's quite cold at Hogwarts when not near a fire. (Though before I opened the link I thought of the gowns worn at Oxford, which movie!Snape wears over his coat and which gave a rather different idea of the horrors of wizarding fashion!)

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

You would think the supposedly superior wizards would have figured out some sort of central heating system by now, wouldn't you? Or maybe they just like things inconvenient.

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

It wouldn't surprise me if the Gryffindors consider it a test of courage and everyone else asked their head of house to teach them a personal warming spell.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Well, Durmstrang is worse - they only use fires for magical purposes.