HBP Chapter Twenty-Four: "Sectumsempra"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

* Ron and Hermione are “both satisfyingly impressed” by the way Harry managed to get the memory… by, erm, dosing himself up on a potion that gave him super-high levels of luck. Yeah, real skilful there, Harry.

* It’s a good day for Hermione – she gets to feel superior at Ron because he was too cowardly to break up with Lavender, pleased that their relationship broke up anyway, and amused by the knowledge that she was instrumental in making this happen. If only she could find some excuse for righteously branding a nasty word across Lavender’s face, her day would be perfect.

* It turns out Ginny and Dean split up, too. Harry “thought there was a rather knowing look in [Hermione’s] eye as she told him that, but she could not possibly know that his insides were suddenly dancing the conga.” I don’t know, Harry, I wouldn’t put it past her to learn Legilimency and go around mind-reading people – for the greater good, of course…

* Harry and Ron have spent the whole class talking and consequently haven’t learnt anything. So obviously, if he gets savaged by a hippogriff, he totally deserves it.

* Harry’s interior monologue is being a bit presumptuous here, like of course Ginny’s going to go out with him if he asks, and the only issue is how Ron might react. The idea that Ginny might not actually want to go out with him at all doesn’t really seem to cross his mind.

* Harry’s curiosity about Katie even drives Ginny from his head. Wow, he must be curious. I mean, he normally spends so much time thinking about his crushes.

* “In his mind’s eye he watched a parade of Crabbes and Goyles prance past, all transformed into girls.” Now there’s an interesting slash-fic idea if ever I saw one. :p

* It would be a complete waste of Felix Felicis to try and get into the RoR, says Hermione. Because obviously, if you’re trying to guess the precise formula of words which will let you into a room, incredible luck isn’t going to help you at all.

* Although if they want some more FF, is there any reason why Harry can’t just take a swig of the stuff and ask Slughorn for another bottle? Or even just use some of his inherited fortune to buy some? I’m sure there must be professional potion-makers he could buy from.

* Of course, the Trio were perfectly happy to spend months brewing a ridiculously complex potion in COS, so I’m not sure why they don’t consider doing so now. I mean, come on, they’re the wizarding world’s only hope for stopping the most powerful dark lord in a century, they need all the advantages they can get.

* Dean’s upset that his relationship with Ginny has ended. Ginny on the other hand is totally fine and perky. Of course.

* Harry keeps getting hit by Bludgers because he’s too busy looking at Ginny to keep his eye on the, er, Snitch. And no, I don’t know why looking at the Snitch all the time would help him to avoid a completely different ball, either.

* “The run-up to this crucial match had all the usual features,” not least another desperate attempt to convince us that (a) Gryffindor actually have a chance of losing the Cup, and (b) Quidditch is really important and we should totally care about how well Gryffindor does.

* Harry still hasn’t forgotten about Malfoy. I wish the readers could, because then this whole Quidditch subplot might stop seeming so pointless and uninteresting by comparison.

* Only kidding, Quidditch subplots have always been pointless and uninteresting since at least POA.

* Harry finds Draco and Moaning Myrtle an “unlikely coupling”. Clearly he hasn’t been reading enough fanfic.

* Harry sees Draco crying, leading him to realise that, even if he doesn’t like him, Malfoy’s still a human being with emotions and difficulties just like Harry, and Harry should try and get past his dislike and treat him as a fellow person. Lol jk, they have a fight and Harry doesn’t feel a twinge of sympathy even when he cuts Draco’s chest open.

* Not sure how Harry and Draco can keep missing each other from opposite sides of the bathroom, but whatever.

* Wow, Malfoy must really be speaking slowly if Harry can say “Sectumsempra!” in the time it takes Draco to say “-o”. Maybe it’s that Malfoy theatricality making him cast all his spells in a villainous drawl.

* Oh look, that mysterious spell marked “for enemies” turned out to be quite dangerous. Never saw that one coming.

* So what’s the significance of this “incantation that sounded almost like a song” which Snape uses to heal Draco? Is it some ancient spell which predates the introduction of single pseudo-Latin words? If so, is Snape’s description of Sectumsempra as “dark magic” a piece of evidence in favour of the theory that dark magic is older, less “tamed” magic?

* So Draco goes to the Hospital Wing, and Harry immediately forgets about how he almost murdered him, instead focusing on the far more important question of what will happen if his Potions crib sheet gets taken away.

* Not sure why Snape doesn’t insist on going with Harry to the Gryffindor Common Room. Surely he must realise that Potter might try and switch books or something?

* I like the foreshadowing with the tiara and Vanishing Cabinet inside the ROR. Then again, given that Harry doesn’t use the textbook again, this whole hiding it scene is kind of pointless.

* Harry runs back, and arrives with a “searing pain in his chest”. Which is a coincidence, because that’s probably how Malfoy’s feeling right about now.

* So Snape gives Harry a few detentions for being “a liar and a cheat” (not even for almost killing Draco! WTF?), and Harry’s reaction is to bitch and moan about it to his friends. I mean, seriously, what is up with this boy? If I were in Harry’s position, I’d be on my knees in thanks that I wasn’t going to be expelled.

* Harry feels “sicker, he was sure, than Ron ever felt in his life” because his team might lose an intra-school sports competition. Not because his recklessness had endangered the life of a fellow-student. Urgh, just… just urgh.

* So Pansy Parkinson’s been to the Hospital Wing “vilifying” Harry. Not that she’d need to, really, I think his actions vilify him quite well enough on their own.

* Apparently “the looks on the Gryffindor team’s faces when he had told them he would not be able to play on Saturday had been the worst punishment of all”. As opposed to, say, the look on Draco’s face as he lay dying on the toilet-room floor.

* Now Harry’s worrying that Ginny and Dean might get back together if he’s not there to keep an eye on them. Can this boy get any more narcissistic?

* Also, even though Harry’s heard Malfoy say that his life’s in danger if he doesn’t carry out his task, nobody bothers talking about this new piece of information. Normally I could chalk this up to trauma at the realisation he’s nearly killed someone causing Harry to forget things, but Harry clearly isn’t traumatised at what’s just happened.

* Also, this chapter must be quite bad for H/D fanficcers. Even when Draco’s almost been killed, Harry still prefers to talk and think about his potions book and about the upcoming Quidditch match.

* Harry’s pet attack harpy valiantly rises to his aid, defending his use of deadly spells in the face of an Unforgivable Curse. Even though a less dangerous spell, like Stupefy or Expeliarmus or Petrificus Totalis, would have been just as effective in self-defence, so there’s really no need to go around slicing people’s chests open.

* “‘Oh, don’t start acting as though you understand Quidditch,’ snapped Ginny, ‘you’ll only embarrass yourself.’” Wait, where does Hermione’s apparent reputation as a Quidditch ignoramus come from? We’ve never seen any signs of ignorance on her part. Or maybe Ginny’s just using “doesn’t understand Quidditch” to mean “not obsessed with Gryffindor winning at Quidditch”, in which case I suppose Hermione, like every sane reader on the planet, doesn’t really understand Quidditch.

* So Harry ends the night feeling “unbelievably cheerful” and not at all guilty about almost murdering somebody.  Fun challenge: imagine what the narrative voice would say if Draco almost killed Harry and spent the rest of the evening laughing and joking with his Slytherin friends.

* The Gryffindors are “most unhappy that their Captain had got himself banned from the final match of the season”. As opposed to, say, the fact that their Captain had almost flipping murdered someone in the bathroom. Eurgh, I know I keep going on about this, but everybody’s reactions are just bizarre. It almost reads as if the chapter was originally written so that Harry had genuinely done something minor and his being stopped from playing Quidditch was actually unfair, the Sectumsempra bit being added later and never really integrated properly into the surrounding narrative. So reactions which would have made sense if Harry had been treated harshly now seem disturbingly callous and lacking in empathy.

* Copying up records of your dad’s old school days doesn’t sound that unpleasant actually. Personally I’d be interested in seeing all the things my parents got up to.

* Oh, it looks like Gryffindor won anyway, so Harry doesn’t even have to suffer the torment of knowing that he caused his team to lose a sports match. Phew!

* TBH I think that if Ginny ran towards me with a “hard, blazing look” I’d run as fast as I could in the opposite direction.

* Naturally, the first thing Harry does after kissing Ginny is look around to make sure that his rivals are all feeling suitably humiliated.

Comments

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/by, erm, dosing himself up on a potion that gave him super-high levels of luck/

It’s not even like he made the potion himself. The potion was given to him after he won it by relying on someone else’s work. So, yeah, Harry didn’t make any effort at all.

/feel superior at Ron because he was too cowardly to break up with Lavender/

Meanwhile, she used Cormac to make Ron jealous because she was too cowardly to just tell Ron how she felt about him.

/pleased that their relationship broke up anyway, and amused by the knowledge that she was instrumental in making this happen./

Because she’s behaving like a spiteful and selfish brat. Why did JKR think that the romance subplot was a good idea, again?

/there was a rather knowing look in [Hermione’s] eye/

Well, Hermione knew all about Harry’s feelings for Cho and vice versa in OotP, so it’s not that surprising that she knows about Ginny too.

/his insides were suddenly dancing the conga/

Nooo, it’s Anastasia Steele’s inner goddess from Fifty Shades of Grey! D:

/Harry sees Draco crying, leading him to realise that, even if he doesn’t like him, Malfoy’s still a human being with emotions and difficulties just like Harry, and Harry should try and get past his dislike and treat him as a fellow person. Lol jk, they have a fight/

Well, like you said, Harry doesn’t read fanfiction, and at least Harry panics and shows more of a reaction here than he does in the movie. In the movie, he doesn’t panic or anything, he just stares at Draco and then walks out of the room when Snape shows up.

/time it takes Draco to say “-o”/

The fact that the Cruciatus Curse is supposed to be one of the Unforgivables and is supposed to only work when the caster really wants to torture someone makes it all the more unbelievable that Draco cast this spell. I mean, if it can be used as flippantly and as impulsively as it is here, what’s stopping everyone else from trying to cast it at people they don’t like, aside from it being illegal? The Cruciatus Curse is a torture curse, yet Draco’s flinging it out here like it’s just another hex. Maybe this is to show what an awful person Draco really is, because he’s using it without thinking, but we never see or hear of another instance where he tried to torture someone. In DH, we see that he’s clearly upset by being forced to do it. So, what gives? Or is this just supposed to justify Harry’s Sectumsempra?

/not even for almost killing Draco!/

When Snape of all people doesn’t chew Harry out for almost killing Draco, you know that there’s something wrong with the narrative.

/If I were in Harry’s position, I’d be on my knees in thanks that I wasn’t going to be expelled/

And I’d still be panicking about almost killing someone. Even if I didn’t like the person, I’d still be worried about whether they were going to be okay. At the very least, I wouldn’t just worry about expulsion, I’d worry about jail.

/So Pansy Parkinson’s been to the Hospital Wing “vilifying” Harry./

Dear Lord, talk about Protagonist-Centered Morality.

/chapter must be quite bad for H/D fanficcers/

Actually, no, a lot of H/D shippers that I saw liked this chapter because Harry and Draco got to interact with each other (and, of course, like you said before, it readily lends itself to H/D fanfics). That Harry forgets about Draco ten minutes after he almost kills him is negligible, I guess.

/imagine what the narrative voice would say if Draco almost killed Harry and spent the rest of the evening laughing and joking with his Slytherin friends./

Didn’t a milder version of this happen in OotP? Harry beat up Draco and then the rest of the chapter was spent on Harry feeling put-upon because Umbridge banned him from playing Quidditch.

/As opposed to, say, the fact that their Captain had almost flipping murdered someone in the bathroom./

Which is why I don’t understand the point of that scene. It’s a Big-Lipped Alligator Moment. Nobody talks about it again, nobody has an appropriate reaction, Harry doesn’t use Sectumsempra again (except at the end of this book) and doesn’t learn anything, we never learn how Draco feels about it, it doesn’t lead to any consequences, it just disappears from the narrative as soon as it’s over. So, what was the point?

[oryx_leucoryx]

* Harry’s curiosity about Katie even drives Ginny from his head. Wow, he must be curious. I mean, he normally spends so much time thinking about his crushes.

So: Quidditch > Ginny > safety of the wizarding world ( > anything to do with the world of people).

Although if they want some more FF, is there any reason why Harry can’t just take a swig of the stuff and ask Slughorn for another bottle?

Yes. If a genie is going to grant you one wish, the most efficient way to use that wish is to ask for some large number of additional wishes.

Dean’s upset that his relationship with Ginny has ended. Ginny on the other hand is totally fine and perky. Of course.

Because Ginny is planning on trading up, whereas Dean knows he can only trade down, after having dated the most desirable girl at Hogwarts? (Why only Hogwarts? The most desirable world in the world for all eternity, of course.)

* Wow, Malfoy must really be speaking slowly if Harry can say “Sectumsempra!” in the time it takes Draco to say “-o”. Maybe it’s that Malfoy theatricality making him cast all his spells in a villainous drawl.

Perhaps Draco didn't really mean the Crucio, and was hoping for Harry to stop him by doing something in between? Like Harry's famous Expeliarmus?

So what’s the significance of this “incantation that sounded almost like a song” which Snape uses to heal Draco? Is it some ancient spell which predates the introduction of single pseudo-Latin words? If so, is Snape’s description of Sectumsempra as “dark magic” a piece of evidence in favour of the theory that dark magic is older, less “tamed” magic?

Or that healing Sectumsempra is exceptionally hard and can't be done in a single word? Or that Severus worked very hard to find a cure for Sectumsempra? Or that George's ear could have totally be regrown if only Molly had a better singing voice? (Shrieking the incantation does *not* work!)

Not sure why Snape doesn’t insist on going with Harry to the Gryffindor Common Room. Surely he must realise that Potter might try and switch books or something?

He *wants* Harry to hide the evidence. Because how can he justify *not* expelling Harry if it is revealed exactly what spells Harry had been using that year?

I like the foreshadowing with the tiara and Vanishing Cabinet inside the ROR. Then again, given that Harry doesn’t use the textbook again, this whole hiding it scene is kind of pointless.

The only purpose of hiding the book is to allow Harry to find the tiara (sorry, diadem, it gets an upgrade in the next book). because Rowling couldn't come up with a way for Harry to actually reason his way to it.

So Snape gives Harry a few detentions for being “a liar and a cheat” (not even for almost killing Draco! WTF?)

When Dumbles revealed (as it turns out, a few months previous to this point) to Severus that the plan was for Harry to die, the first thing Severus lashed out about was how Dumbles made Severus *lie* for him, and it wasn't even with the intent that Harry survive. I think living the life of a spy gave Severus an admiration for truth, and seeing Harry lie repeatedly for trivial gain made Severus feel his own efforts being cheapened.

“‘Oh, don’t start acting as though you understand Quidditch,’ snapped Ginny, ‘you’ll only embarrass yourself.’”
Ahem. How embarrassingly wrong is it to point out that having the team's star Seeker not-playing worsens the team's chance at winning?

[dracasadiablo.livejournal.com]

Ron and Hermione are “both satisfyingly impressed” by the way Harry managed to get the memory
After DH!Harry I'm also impressed by it too. He actually did something! Sure, it took him months to get to it but he did it. Although, I do find the idea of having a YA hero who's smarter and more useful when he's high a bit strange.

Of course, the Trio were perfectly happy to spend months brewing a ridiculously complex potion in COS, so I’m not sure why they don’t consider doing so now. I mean, come on, they’re the wizarding world’s only hope for stopping the most powerful dark lord in a century, they need all the advantages they can get.
Ah, but they had years to learn that things will just fall in their laps. And they been living in WW long enough for it to corrode their morals and ability to think.

Wow, Malfoy must really be speaking slowly if Harry can say “Sectumsempra!” in the time it takes Draco to say “-o”. Maybe it’s that Malfoy theatricality making him cast all his spells in a villainous drawl.
I never understood anything about the "Sectumsempra" mess. Even if you ignore everything about Harry not feeling guilty and pretty much everybody acting as almost killing somebody is nothing to worry about (by that point I was convinced that book 7 will end with the Trio "turned dark" and that we'll be shown how the whole WW is inherently twisted and damaging) it still makes no sense.
Why make such a big deal of "Expeliarmus" being Harry's signature spell? If it is; shouldn't he have used it here too?
Also, Harry spent a lot of time (in book 4 before the last task and with DA during the book 5) training and practicing offensive and defensive spells. Shouldn't he used any of those spells?
I mean, if attacked somebody with martial arts training will react with moves they used most / know best. Sometimes it will be a pure muscle memory reaction with no thinking involved. They aren't likely to use a move they read (but never seen or used) about once.

Harry feels “sicker, he was sure, than Ron ever felt in his life”
Because Ron never had anything to feel sick about! Like; he never went used his father's flying car and was told that his father is facing inquiry about that? Or was totally helpless while trying to save his baby sister? Or...
Nope, Harry not being able to play a stupid game is more important then all that.

Also, this chapter must be quite bad for H/D fanficcers. Even when Draco’s almost been killed, Harry still prefers to talk and think about his potions book and about the upcoming Quidditch match.
H/D fandome tends to squick me out. H/D interaction was always brimming with abuse to me. First it was verbal, then Harry physically attacked Draco and then he almost killed him and was okay with that. Oh, and he always enjoyed Draco's pain and humiliation a bit too much for my taste.

Naturally, the first thing Harry does after kissing Ginny is look around to make sure that his rivals are all feeling suitably humiliated.
Well, he couldn't have heroically brandished the captured Snitch, now could he? Showing off your prize Ginny is almost as good.

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

It’s a good day for Hermione. If only she could find some excuse for righteously branding a nasty word across Lavender’s face, her day would be perfect.

Ooohhh, good one! Like "slut," "tramp," "trollop," strumpet," or "boyfriend thief." That last is the best choice, since it's the longest.

* Harry’s interior monologue is being a bit presumptuous here, like of course Ginny’s going to go out with him if he asks, and the only issue is how Ron might react. The idea that Ginny might not actually want to go out with him at all doesn’t really seem to cross his mind.


Well, girls--except for self-insert Hermione, and, to a lesser extent, feisty Lily--are just chattel, to be bargained for by men as prizes, so their opinions don't matter. Not to mention that worrying about your male friend's feelings rather than the girl's is another example of subliminal homoeroticism.

I mean, come on, they’re the wizarding world’s only hope for stopping the most powerful dark lord in a century, they need all the advantages they can get.

I wish they'd used some of this in DH and saved us all from the camping trip. We readers needed FF then! D:

If I were in Harry’s position, I’d be on my knees in thanks that I wasn’t going to be expelled.

That's why you're not the chosen one. You don't have the right entitled attitude. ;)

Harry feels “sicker, he was sure, than Ron ever felt in his life”

Also notice how narcissistic that is. He just knows his feelings are worse than anyone else's.

So Pansy Parkinson’s been to the Hospital Wing “vilifying” Harry. Not that she’d need to, really, I think his actions vilify him quite well enough on their own.

Only in a sane universe. Not here, unfortunately.

Apparently “the looks on the Gryffindor team’s faces when he had told them he would not be able to play on Saturday had been the worst punishment of all”. As opposed to, say, the look on Draco’s face as he lay dying on the toilet-room floor.

Well, sure. They're Gryffindors, and he's a Slytherin. Only their pain matters.

TBC

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

Now Harry’s worrying that Ginny and Dean might get back together if he’s not there to keep an eye on them. Can this boy get any more narcissistic?

Oh, sure. Wait until DH, when Harry wastes three months sitting on his can fantasizing about Voldemort and the Hallows.

It almost reads as if the chapter was originally written so that Harry had genuinely done something minor and his being stopped from playing Quidditch was actually unfair, the Sectumsempra bit being added later and never really integrated properly into the surrounding narrative. So reactions which would have made sense if Harry had been treated harshly now seem disturbingly callous and lacking in empathy.

That's a very astute observation. That may be what actually happened, but Rowling's editors--presuming she had them at this point--said, "The story's kind of dragging here. You need to add some excitement," and this was her solution. Then she just didn't bother to rewrite the rest of the book so it would make sense.

Copying up records of your dad’s old school days doesn’t sound that unpleasant actually. Personally I’d be interested in seeing all the things my parents got up to.

Ah, but your parents weren't violent delinquents--I hope! What makes this so bad is that it proves Snape was right about the James gang. Worst of all, they didn't just torment him, which Harry might be able to rationalize. They went after other, apparently innocent people, as well. Even Harry can see that's bad.

TBH I think that if Ginny ran towards me with a “hard, blazing look” I’d run as fast as I could in the opposite direction.

Yes, but you're a sane person. I come up with an explanation for Ginny's look later in my sporking.

Naturally, the first thing Harry does after kissing Ginny is look around to make sure that his rivals are all feeling suitably humiliated.

Of course. Boyfriends and girlfriends aren't romantic companions in this society. They're prizes to prove your status and lord it over other people. That's why Severus never had a chance with Lily. He wasn't important enough, not "prize-worthy." This is a medieval society dragged into the present, so the idea of mates as prizes of war and signs of status makes perfect sense, even though it's rather sick in a modern context. What's even sicker is the number of fans who have no problems with this attitude.

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

* Wow, Malfoy must really be speaking slowly if Harry can say “Sectumsempra!” in the time it takes Draco to say “-o”. Maybe it’s that Malfoy theatricality making him cast all his spells in a villainous drawl.


Or, he did finish casting it while Harry was shouting. Only, he didn't manage to mean it, so it did nothing to Harry, just like Barty Jr. told his class that they could all simultaneously cast AK at him and it wouldn't so much as give him a nosebleed.

Unlike Harry's first attempt at casting it, which knocked Bella down and hurt her even though she taunted he could do better (quite correctly, as it chances).

See, Draco's such a wuss he can't even want to torture someone he hates! No wonder he did't Sort Gryff.

[nx74defiant.livejournal.com]

Or even just use some of his inherited fortune to buy some?

Harry never shows any interest in his funds does he? He just uses it for school supplies or lets Molly buy his school supplies. Harry doesn't show any interest in the normal things he can get now. Clothes that fit, new glasses, buying himself a new broom.

He doesn't go wild spending it like some people who suddenly come into money do.
The only time he gets anything extra is the 1st day on the train, he buys out the treat cart and shares with Ron.

Or to the other direction he shows no interest in building up and saving more money.