Philosopher's Stone Chapter Thirteen
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deathtocapslockPhilosopher’s Stone Chapter Thirteen
*Harry’s mind, such as it was, was certainly beginning to unravel due to the evil spell of the mirror of Erised. We now know that this dose of it was all part of Dumblesnore’s scheme to make Harry value his life on Earth less. The images from the Resurrection Stone complete the effect.
*Ron’s sharp as eleven year old boys go. Pity it won’t last ;)
*Curiously Hermione has no thoughts about the mirror. Maybe they forgot to tell her about it. I wonder what her reaction would have been.
*Isn’t it great how efficiently the magical world works? Any literate muggle could have looked up Flamel immediately. In fact, you could all now just google him.
*Gryffindor could overtake Slytherin for the first time in seven years... the same seven years that have elapsed since Charlie Weasley left Hogwarts and which are a gap in the time line that is entirely down to JKR’s innumeracy. The chaos which JKR’s backwardness has created in the timeline caused many fans to think that there must be multiple timelines at work due to Voldemort tampering with the timeline...
*I wonder what the system is for appointing the Quidditch referee? Did Dumbledore give Snape the position just to wind him up (knowing it would be unnecessary since he was going to be watching Quirrell himself)?
*Ron can show off his chess skills while they last. Unfortunately Hermione’s losing at it today won’t do her any good in the long run.
*Wood should know that any game played by Gryffindor, however dirty, is nonetheless, clean by very definition! IOIAGDI!
*There’s no reserve seeker. Don’t ask why, just close your eyes and pretend it makes sense.
*At the risk of sounding repetitive, I should reiterate that when Malfoy bullies someone it is a totally different matter to Harry doing it, or the Weasley twins doing it - IOIAGDI! So Harry hexing Crabbe and the old squib caretaker in a surreptitious fashion is nothing whatsoever like Malfoy using the leg locker curse on Neville. Furthermore, using the leg locker curse on Neville for laughs would be perfectly acceptable if the twins did it, since they were sorted into Gryffindor and Malfoy was not.
*And Harry thoughtfully reminds Neville of the fact that Neville is one of the elect and Malfoy isn’t. There, Malfoy really has nothing to be proud of.
* So finally Harry sees Flamel’s name again, by sheer chance. It’s just as well that he was brought up in a Roald Dahl setting, otherwise the magical world would be seeming vastly inferior and he would not want to stay.
*So Hermione never thought to look in a book she had already got out of the library...?
*Strangely the US edition calls the Philosopher’s Stone "the Sorcerer’s Stone," I wonder why? Anyway, Harry and Ron had not heard of the Philsopher’s Stone which ought to embarrass both of them soundly.
*JKR really was overreaching herself with trying to give Flamel a specific age. I bet she thinks he was brought up in the Victorian era even though he was 665 whenever that book was written/ updated ;)
*Werewolf bites were treatable by first years here... oh dear maths continuity.
*Harry and Ron are too young to grasp that creating an unlimited supply of gold would make it worthless, except in its industrial applications, but then this is something which alchemists of bygone eras in the real world also failed to grasp.
*It’s cute how easily little Harry could put problems, such as the Quidditch match out of mind as long as they were out of sight. He is as fatuous as Billy Bunter in that respect. Although Bunter was actually a more cunning boarding school character, he did at least have a sort of slyness that can come with fatuity.
*Naturally Harry hasn’t heard of Legilmency ;) Of course Snape can read what there is of Harry’s mind! I bet it doesn’t take long.
*Being 12 and already called a nag is not a good sign ;)
*It really is rare for Dumblesnore to take an interest in anything to do with the school. I wonder if any previous head was so indifferent?
*Like that Snape? There was no need for you to referee, Egodore was simply pulling your leg.
*Snape should not give Hufflepuff a penalty because George attacked him – IOIAGDI!
*Malfoy is still pleading for attention, this time by trying to needle Ron and Neville. This year he doesn’t quite grasp that it is the Potterverse, not the Malfoyverse....
*Neville takes Crabbe and Goyle on, but not in the true Gryffindor fashion – that would involve Crabbe and Goyle being outnumbered four to one. Oh well, perhaps Neville will prove to be a worthy Gryffindor someday...
*Has Harry broken a record? The Snitch is drawn to him because he is the Chosen One?
*Hermione and Parvati are very happy that the tedious game only lasted five minutes.
*I wonder what Fumblewhore would have done if Harry hadn’t been over his nocturnal visions in the Mirror of Erised? Would it have mattered, if he had already scheduled Harry’s death for this academic year?
*Curiously Harry keeps his broom in the shed this year instead of in the dormitory.
*A slightly more interesting scene here – Harry half-overhears Snape confronting Quirrell, but it makes Snape seem more sinister. Voldemort actually believed his paper thin disguise was effective. I suppose Snape already knew Voldemort was present...?
*Talk about showing Slytherin! What exactly Slytherin were shown is a difficult question...
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no subject
Date: 2012-02-05 05:03 pm (UTC)Well. Hogwarts is the school for all magical kids in the UK, whatever their blood status, right? And always has been.
Someone is supposed to graduate with the basics of magical knowledge, presumably ready to take on an entry-level job at the Ministry, to serve an apprenticeship, or to enter a training program to become a Healer, an Auror, or the like.
Non-purebloods are now the majority of the student population, acto Jo.
Things like removing the Dark Arts from the curriculum--well, the old, rich families have extensive libraries, and can teach their kids themselves whatever is missing from their formal education. Or hire tutors.
So leaving gaps in the formal education gives an advantage to those families who know what those gaps are and have the will and the power (or money) to remedy the deficiencies.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-06 03:42 am (UTC)And they approved (initially) hiring Dumbles (a half-blood!) as headmaster.
I think it took a while before they understood the repercussions of Dumble's various reforms, recognized that their own kids were suffering, and realized that with a large majority of the younger generation mis-informed that the Dark Arts were "bad," Dark Arts practicioners might be targeted for perfectly legal and legitimate activities....
(I think it also took a long time, and maybe TOM, to make the Purebloods recognize that they'd somehow slid into being a minority. And that not all of their supposed "inferiors" would grant them the deference and privilege they imagined to be their due. In fact, that most now wouldn't. Dumbledore appointed a half-blood to be head of Slytherin House!)
Lucius was reacting to (if we accept Whitehound's reading of Dumbles being appointed ca. 1963/4) nearly thirty years of the Twinkly One's "leadership." (Longer, if we think Minerva was originally hired for Twinkles' vacated Transfiguratio post in 1956 when he moved up.)
And Lucius was apparently the first to act openly to oust the headmaster.
At least, that we know of.
Moreover, to Dumbledore's direct reign add on decades, perhaps, of Dumbledore's previously being the headmaster's eminence grise. (If the persuadable Armando was headmaster all along between the 1940's right up until Albus's ascension to the post.)
And it takes until 1993 and the younger Malfoy's influence on the Board of Governors to decide them to suspend Albus?
I think we're dealing with the standard slowly-warming pot scenario here: at first everything seemed acceptable, then it gradually grew worse, but who will draw the line and
say, no more?
And I think for a long while along the way, the Purebloods truly believed their own children would not suffer as a result of Albus's innovations. Whoever else might.
Perhaps it's Lucius's personal experience of being targeted by Albus's proteges that makes him realize the long-term consequences of misinforming the hoi polloi that Dark equals Evil?
If you look at it, Dumbles has apparently been twisting the education offered at Hogwarts since at least the 1940's (by which time we see him exerting an unhealty influence over Dippet). Fifty years, by the opening of canon. Albus is engaged in ruining his third generation, when we first meet him.....
no subject
Date: 2012-02-05 09:51 pm (UTC)George should really have been expelled for that...
*Talk about showing Slytherin! What exactly Slytherin were shown is a difficult question...
This could be a motto for the whole series!
*Naturally Harry hasn’t heard of Legilmency ;) Of course Snape can read what there is of Harry’s mind! I bet it doesn’t take long.
Even JKR hadn't heard of it till OOTP, and even then didn't really develop it at all.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-09 07:58 pm (UTC)It makes absolutely no sense not to have back up players. Every team sport I know of in school had "second string" or "bench warmers". And what about bring on younger players as the older players start nearing graduation? Given the likelyhood of injury in Quidditch it makes no sense not to have replacements prepared.It almost makes you think JK gave no thought to how the teams worked :)
no subject
Date: 2012-02-14 03:21 am (UTC)