HBP Chapter Thirteen: "The Secret Riddle"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

* Ron and Hermione feign deafness whenever Harry brings up his DE!Draco theory, but neither of them ever seems to wonder who the actual culprit is. Come on, trio, what’s happened to you? Why this uncharacteristic lack of curiosity?

* Maybe Draco’s just been covering his tracks by putting some chemical into the school water supply which reduces curiosity and overall intellectual ability. That explains why nobody ever mounts a serious investigation into the Katie Bell incident, and why all the characters are so stupid in this novel.

* Harry’s all indignant that Snape cured Katie. Yeah, curse that meanie, going around making people healthy!

* Dumbledore promises to take “all appropriate measures” to find out who might have caused Katie Bell’s accident. Obviously he doesn’t also promise to do anything about what he finds; equally obviously, nobody ever calls him out on this.

* And it’s time for a few episodes of Tom Riddle’s Schooldays again. I’m not sure why Dumbles is so sure that Merope made a conscious decision not to use magic. Even if she did go to Hogwarts, they don’t seem to teach any medical spells, so if she was dying of a disease there’s not much she’d be able to do.

* Still, don’t judge Merope too harshly; she never had Lilly’s courage, after all. Never mind that being courageous isn’t actually much of a defence against illness, or that the kind of courage needed to keep going on in a hopeless situation is different to the kind of courage needed to stand up to a homicidal maniac, making the two cases rather difficult to compare, or that Lilly’s death wasn’t actually that brave in the first place.

* Memory!Dumbledore is drawing many curious glances with his flamboyant purple suit. Actually I’m starting to believe that wizards actually know perfectly well how muggles dress, and just keep wearing really weird clothes because they can’t bear not being the centre of attention.

* Mrs. Cole is “an inconveniently sharp woman”, meaning that she actually wants to know what the strange man come to take one of her charges away is going to do with him. I suppose that when you’ve been living with wizards a while the criteria for being “sharp” tend to diminish somewhat.

* Luckily Dumbledore is able to use magic to get her to do his bidding. Phew! For a moment there I thought he might have had to actually treat that uppity muggle like a human being.

* Although I’m not sure why Dumbledore felt the need to get her drunk as well as zapping her mind. Maybe he fancied a drink isn’t allowed any alcohol while on school business, and this way he can pretend it was necessary to do his job. All in the line of duty, Prof. Dippet!

* It’s not surprising Tom never really gets on with Dumbledore. Hogwarts only has room for one bullying, manipulative psychopath.

* I wonder if JKR intended to have child abuse undertones around the incident in the cave, or whether they were just accidental, like the centaur!rape in OOTP.

* Bizarrely, Dumbledore doesn’t stop to consider whether teaching this disturbed individual dangerous magic might not be a good idea. Nor, for that matter, does anybody else. It’s no wonder the wizarding world has so many dark lords, their education policy is just so lax.

* “There was no trace of the Gaunts in Tom Riddle’s face.” No, it was all in his blood, his filthy, tainted blood.

* “Tell the truth!” yells Tom. Yeah, good luck getting that out of Professor Dumbledore.

* Thieving is not tolerated at Hogwarts during Dippet’s headship. With Dumbledore in control, Luna Lovegood will be putting up posters asking people to return her stolen items. Go figure.

* Given that Ron has to go through COS without a wand, I assume the hardship fund was discontinued sometime in Dumbledore’s reign.

* It’s strange that Dumbledore lets Tom go shopping on his own. I know the man doesn’t generally care much for students’ welfare, but he might want to stop the budding psychopath wandering into Nockturn Alley.

* Ways the later books ruin the early books # 477: Dumbledore’s seeing through Tom now looks rather less impressive, and his not telling anybody about the boy’s personality looks extremely negligent.

* Dumbledore had no idea Tom was going to grow up into a dark lord. Odd, because I imagine most muggle psychiatrists – heck, most muggles in general – would be able to tell that teaching such a child dangerous magic wasn’t going to end well.

* I suppose Dumbledore interprets the idea of “keeping an eye” on someone very narrowly, so as to exclude actually intervening if the person goes off the rails or gets into trouble. Either that or he was just lying through his teeth when he said he kept an eye on Tom.

* Tom was “highly self-sufficient, secretive, and, apparently, friendless,” and “preferred to operate alone.” So basically he was like Dumbledore Jnr., then.

* I’m not sure what it was about the mouth-organ that made Harry think it was significant in some way.

* As diverting as these Voldemort flashbacks are, I don’t see why Dumbledore couldn’t have just told Harry the information they contain. He could have got it over and done with in one or two sessions, leaving the rest of the year free for practical information, such as how to recognise and destroy horcruxes.

Comments

[danajsparks.livejournal.com]

----And I always wondered why, if Dumbledore thought there was something 'troubled' about Tom Riddle, he didn't do something about it. Keep a closer eye on him, so he couldn't frame innocent, naievely-dense students for his own crimes. Maybe, even, try to do something to turn him from the Dark Side to the Light. Such as finding out what exactly life was like at the orphanage, especially for a 'freak' with no friends

I question how truly concerned Albus was at the time that he was dealing with a future dark lord during his first encounter with Tom Riddle. I rather suspect that this may be a case of 20/20 hindsight. Albus could look back through his early memories of Tom and say, "Ah, yes, there were warning signs," but I'm not sure if he really saw those warning signs back in 1938.

First, it appears to be unusual for young children to have significant control over their magic, and it is apparently normal for children to perform accidental magic when experiencing intense emotions. Therefore, at the time it would have been reasonable for Albus to conclude that Tom had mostly been doing accidental magic in response to being provoked rather than deliberately using his magic to hurt the other children.

Second, given the lessons of history, I imagine that it is/was conventional wisdom in the wizarding world that Muggles generally hate and fear magic and that it is simply the nature of Muggles to attack those who are magical. And Albus had had the personal experience of his sister's attack to reinforce this belief. Therefore, I think it's quite possible that, at the time, Albus assumed that any of Tom's conflicts at the orphanage were mainly the fault of the ignorant Muggles surrounding the boy. It's possible that Albus didn't initially view Tom as a budding psychopath but rather as an understandably angry child who had been bullied by the other children for being magical, much like Arianna had been.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Except that we see Tom *consciously* attempt a deliberate baby-Imperio on Dumbledore himself. When it doesn't work, he is shocked, and clearly assumes that this means that Dumbles is special - implying that he's used to it working on people, because he's tried before. Dumbledore can see all of this, and isn't stupid. I don't buy that he concluded that it was all uncontrolled, accidental magic.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Also, there's the rabbit that was found hanging from the rafters. That was not done by accidental magic. (And if it was done non-magically that is as bad as if it was done by intentional magic.)