PS Chapter Six: The Journey from Platform Nine and Three-quarters

[hafl.livejournal.com]

Once again, I'm back after a delay of several months. At this rate I'm going to finish in the next decade.



- I'm kind of mystified why, when the Dursleys treated Harry more as a servant, did Aunt Petunia still come to vacuum his room. It seems a bit inconsistent.

- It is quite nasty for Dursley to leave Harry on the station and then laugh about it, though I don't understand why Dudley joined in with the laughter, when he's supposed to be more or less mortally afraid of Harry at the moment. Safety in crowd?

- Mrs. Weasley is described as plump, so she's the good kind of overweight. I forgot, is there any female character in the series that's the bad kind of overweight?

- Fred and George helping Harry with putting his trunk on a train is a bit strange.

- Mrs. Weasley is just as proud of Percy being prefect as he is, but the twins sensibly don't make fun of her for it.

- Ginny is a Harry fangirl from the very beginning. Compared to the next year, she is much more proactive in wanting to see him.

- I don't think Harry was ever so polite when asking Mrs. Weasley about how he should get to the platform. He was more shy and afraid to admit he doesn't know how to get there.

- Mrs. Weasley is actually quite sensitive about Harry.

- Now, I think that the whole train sequence is reference to the Malory Towers series of school stories, which is a big guilty pleasure of mine, since it's actually kind of crap and most of the characters are awful people. Rather like Harry Potter.

- The comparison may be kind of a stretch, but in both series, the main characters meet their first friend (Ron), the character who is unsympathetic at first, but becomes friend later (Hermione) and the main school antagonist (Draco) on the train.

- Ron almost immediately asks Harry about the scar he got when his parents died. He has trouble with being sensitive right from the start.

- Ron also has no knowledge about Muggles. Notice that he says "What are they like?" not "What was it like?" when asking Harry about living with Muggles.

- I can emphatise with Ron's feelings about his brothers' accomplishments: "Everyone expects me to do as well as the others, but if I do, it’s no big deal, because they did it first." There are lots of recordings of my brother reading out loud before he started going to school. There are none of me doing the same thing.

- Now that I think about it, Ron's character arc is more or less completely established in this scene.

- I'm surprised how easy it is for Harry to make friends with Ron, considering he never had a friend in his life.

- Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans are an idea that sounds fun in concept, but would be completely horrible when put into practice.

- Neville seems to actually care for Trevor, while Ron begins the theme of casual cruelty to animals by saying he would lose a toad as quickly as he would be able to.

- Hermione does not make very good first impression, but that is more in the choice of words.

- Ron explains Quidditch to Harry, but Harry apparently doesn't learn anything from what Ron says.

- This scene is also the first one where Draco behaves like an asshole in more ways than one.

- For all the talk that Harry Potter is subverting the traditional school story, it still plays by the rules. Overtly being a classist asshole is never okay and therefore, Malfoy is not okay.

- I can't see how can anyone get into trouble for fighting on the Hogwarts Express, seeing as there isn't any supervision.

- Making the first years get to the castle by sailing across the lake is a good idea. Not only it makes a strong first impression, but it also allows the older students to get into the Great Hall before them.

Comments

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

Mrs. Weasley is described as plump, so she's the good kind of overweight. I forgot, is there any female character in the series that's the bad kind of overweight?

Aunt Marge.

Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans are an idea that sounds fun in concept, but would be completely horrible when put into practice.

Something that can be said about so much in this serie.

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

Ron also has no knowledge about Muggles

That's because Ron has no past; he sprung into being that very day. How else can you explain him not knowing any wizards either?

- I'm surprised how easy it is for Harry to make friends with Ron, considering he never had a friend in his life.

If we trust the narrator, I'm surprised Harry isn't a lot more scarred (geddit) by 10 years of emotional abuse. No wonder he took a dislike to Malfoy for no reason, after a childhood like we're told he had I'm surprised he doesn't attack people at the slightest provocation or hint of disrespect. The Dursleys must have been sedating him.

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

- For all the talk that Harry Potter is subverting the traditional school story, it still plays by the rules. Overtly being a classist asshole is never okay and therefore, Malfoy is not okay.

Because it makes the social and economic distinctions obvious, whereas everyone else is comfortable with letting them remain unsaid but benefiting nicely from them. None of the muggle-borns or half-bloods ever try to bring magic to the Muggle world.

[oryx_leucoryx]

It is quite nasty for Dursley to leave Harry on the station and then laugh about it, though I don't understand why Dudley joined in with the laughter, when he's supposed to be more or less mortally afraid of Harry at the moment. Safety in crowd?


If he doesn't laugh he might be the next one abandoned somewhere. No, not really likely, but that would have been in his subconscious somewhere.

Also, interesting to look at Petunia's silence, knowing that she accompanied Lily to the platform (beyond the barrier) back in the day.

- Now, I think that the whole train sequence is reference to the Malory Towers series of school stories

And others of this kind.

Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans are an idea that sounds fun in concept, but would be completely horrible when put into practice.

I recall asking my daughter what fraction of everyday substances are likely to be palatable.

but it also allows the older students to get into the Great Hall before them.

Why is this good/important?

[sunnyskywalker]

Just looking at what I have in front of me, you could get a box of Every Flavor Beans that taste like paper towels, all-purpose cleaner, wood, plastic, glass, ceramic, or the toxic metals inside my laptop. Also some chicken. Yum?

[t0ra-chan.livejournal.com]

- Mrs. Weasley is described as plump, so she's the good kind of overweight. I forgot, is there any female character in the series that's the bad kind of overweight?

Aunt Marge, Umbridge and to some extent Hepzibah Smith (she was described as fat, right?).

- Fred and George helping Harry with putting his trunk on a train is a bit strange.

Yeah, that was surprisingly nice of them, but he is Harry Potter, so they might just be sucking up to him. After all, I don't see them ever helping anybody else like they do with Harry.

- Ron explains Quidditch to Harry, but Harry apparently doesn't learn anything from what Ron says.

Maybe Ron is simply crap at explaining Quidditch to someone who had never played or seen it before. Or Harry forgot what Ron told him by the time he gets recruited as Seeker.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/Mrs. Weasley is described as plump, so she's the good kind of overweight. I forgot, is there any female character in the series that's the bad kind of overweight?/

Aunt Marge. Dolores Umbridge. Hepzibah Smith. Was Alecto Carrow described as heavy? I’m not sure if the Fat Lady counts.

/Ron almost immediately asks Harry about the scar he got when his parents died. He has trouble with being sensitive right from the start./

Not unlike Draco’s not-particularly-emotional “Oh, sorry” when Harry tells him that his parents died.

/Ron also has no knowledge about Muggles. Notice that he says "What are they like?" not "What was it like?" when asking Harry about living with Muggles./

Even though his father is fascinated with Muggle culture and reportedly knows a lot about them.

[the-bitter-word.livejournal.com]

Ron explains Quidditch to Harry, but Harry apparently doesn't learn anything from what Ron says.

I think magic affects memory in the WW, which explains why wizards make stupid mistakes like forgetting supposedly old magic, don't realize long-time acquaintances like Moody aren't who they say they are, never mention the mother or her old friends to the son who lost his parents, and forget their own character traits from book to book. Harry is more forgetful (or less aware) than most, though: he doesn't know students he's spent years with in his House, can't remember the identities of famous wizards he just saw in a book, and can't remember an artifact his godfather gave him to ask for help from that godfather.

On the other hand, I can't blame Harry for not understanding Quidditch the first time it was explained to him, or ever. Really, the only thing he had to know was, "Dodge Bludgers, catch the Snitch, and win everything."

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

I seem to remember someone on this board suggesting that magic in the WW is actually a sentient being that gives wizards power in exchange for feeding off their mental capacities. Starting to make a lot of sense, sadly. How else can one explain a world filled with childish adults with few social institutions that make sense?

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

It makes sense if you realize that the entire wizarding world is one big cult. Cults cause people to surrender their adulthood and autonomy in exchange for illusory feelings of security, superiority, belonging, and power. I've read several books about the FLDS recently, and the HP culture sounds exactly like it. I recommend Escape and Triumph, by Carolyn Jessop, and Stolen Innocence, by Elissa Wall.

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

What a fascinating comparison! I had never drawn those parallels but it makes a lot of sense the more that I think about it. Well, other than the polygamy, but the clannishness is very similar.

[urbanman1984.livejournal.com]

>> - Now, I think that the whole train sequence is reference to the Malory Towers series of school stories, which is a big guilty pleasure of mine, since it's actually kind of crap and most of the characters are awful people. Rather like Harry Potter. <<

You are so right.

The train sequence was a device used a great deal in the British Boarding school genre.

[sunnyskywalker]

I wonder what the Dursleys would have done if Harry hadn't found the train? Would Harry have to call them to pick him up? Talk a police officer into taking him home? And I know the Dursleys don't want him to learn magic, but since the school has already shown it won't stop trying to get him, why didn't they decide that since they had to be resigned to it, might as well help the kid go away for the next ten months? It's not like they want him around...

[oryx_leucoryx]

You might be interested in an AU fic named No Thank You.

[sunnyskywalker]

*sporfles*

As much as I dislike the Dursleyish conformity aspect of Harry's refusal, not wanting to be regularly targeted for death is an excellent reason not to go to Hogwarts. And his meddling did often cause as many problems as it solved, like almost giving the Stone to Quirrellmort. Now I'm imagining a future where this Harry eventually decides that well, if magic exists, it must be normal in the sense of occurring in nature, but that doesn't mean he has to go for wizarding culture. He could get tutoring from Hermione and Snape, go out for drinks occasionally with Neville and Cedric, and stay far away from the school.