Deathly Hallows, chapter 2

[anehan]

In Memoriam

* The Dursleys are leaving tea cups outside Harry's bedroom door. What are they, house elves?

*Harry has never learned to heal wounds and thinks it's a serious flaw in his magical education. Maybe he ought to have, you know, studied during the six years at Hogwarts instead of letting Hermione do all his work for him. Sorry, Harry, but you have no one else than yourself to blame. Normal people, if they had a lunatic after their blood, would have actually devoted some time for making sure they weren't completely unprepared.

* Harry has never cleaned his trunk before. Gross. Our Harry isn't much for hygiene.

* Finding a fragment of the mirror Sirius had given him, Harry feels a sudden upsurge of bitter memories, stabs of regret and longing. He suffers, I tell you.

* Harry is going to take his photograh album and a stack of letters with him. Good lord, what does he think he's going to do with them. The boy is an idiot.

* And we come to the sickening obituary by Elphias Doge. One more person whom Dumbledore managed to hoodwink into believing he was a noble person.

* Dumbledore never revealed the remotest anti-Muggle tendency. Except when he bullied the Dursleys. But that doesn't count, because the Dursleys totally deserved it.

* Dumbledore became the most brilliant student Hogwarts had ever seen and constantly outshone his friends. Bet he liked that. It would have done good for him to be second-best at something. Instead, everything confirmed him in his belief that he was superior to others and that it was his duty to manipulate others for the greater good.

* According to Doge, Dumbledore never had Ministerial ambitions. True enough. He just wanted to take over the world.

* "Albus Dumbledore was never proud or vain". Ahahahahahaa!

* Dumbledore's losses "endowed him with great humanity and sympathy". Bitch, please. The man is clearly incapable of empathy.

* Doge was right in one thing, though: Dumbledore always worked for the greater good. Too bad his methods and definition of "greater good" were rather questionable.

* Harry had thought he knew Dumbledore quite well. What made him think that? The great openness Dumbledore displayed in his dealings with Harry, perhaps?

* Harry thinks that the idea of a teen-aged Dumbledore was odd, like trying to imagine a stupid Hermione. Much as I love Hermione, I have no problem in imagining her stupid. She isn't half so clever as she likes to think. For example, what good did it do to the DA to brand the traitor's face? It didn't prevent Marietta from squealing.

* The only personal question Harry had asked Dumbledore was the only one he suspected Dumbledore hadn't answered honestly. That's too naïve even for Harry.

* Unpleasant Skeeter may be, but I at least would rather read her book than any more of Doge's pennings. There might ever be a shred of truth in what she writes, if you manage to discount the more lurid details.

* Skeeter calls the Potter-Dumbledore relationship unhealthy, even sinister. Brava! At least someone finally got it right.

* Another chapter in which nothing happens comes to an end. I really need that alcohol to get through this.



Informed Attributes:
Dumbledore is noble. No, really.

Misdirected Answering:
Did you hear what Dumbledore got up to as a teenager? What do you mean, you're not interested?

Nut o' Fun:
Desiccated beetle eyes.

Final score: 3. Nothing happens in this chapter.

Comments

[t0ra-chan.livejournal.com]

What's even funnier is that Harry does know some healing spells (he healed Demelza's nose in HBP), but suddenly doesn't know any at all. Just like Hermione can alter her parents memories, but a few chapters later has never done a memory charm.

The seventh book is by far the worst of the series; it's full of long, meaningless chapters in which nothing happens at all. And when things do happen it's written so horribly awfully that it's almost worse than the filler chapters.

I think this is because a) JKR wanted it to fit in with the other books in terms of time passing (a school year), and b) to have enough time for Tonks' and Remus' baby to be born. Notice how much stuff suddenly happens in a very short amount of time after Teddy's birth. Everything from the Gringott's heist to the final battle with Voldemort happens all in one day.

[tdotm.livejournal.com]

But why? Why did she want that? Why did it have to follow the school year if they weren’t AT school. Why all the juicy hints of upheaval and guerilla warfare at Hogwarts, when we were stuck in the Tent from Hell?

Why try to fit things around Teddy? What was the point of Teddy? He went from being a photo of a baby, to snogging Victoire. We never met him. There was no meaningful discussion about war ripping families apart. Or Harry's destiny played out again, but peacefully. Harry and Ginny were school aged kids, it wasn't feasible for them to bring him up. It'd be years before they were ready (about the time that James was born perhaps!). Surely his Grandmother must have done it. Plus, how did Tonks (Auror) and Lupin (experienced fighter and werewolf) die, whereas all the (important) school kids survived? Totally unbelievable!

Why didn’t 90% of the plot happen in August? Why wasn’t Luna taken off the train on the way to school in September? Why didn’t the final battle take place on All HALLOWS Eve?

She shot through her credibility to create a plot that was worthless anyway. Arrrggghhh!

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I've been amused for a few books with the way people's behavior blatantly follows a schedule rather than logic. It started to be really obvious in HBP, I think, because she was filling time through most of the year, since the real plot was happening in Slytherin and Harry couldn't see it. So he just hung out until everything happened around June or so.

Dudley's tea is a great example too. Harry saved him way back at the beginning of OotP. Okay, he doesn't think about it right then so he hasn't yet changed. But there's no sign of it in HBP either. Sure Harry was all deep in grief at the time (sure he was!) but wouldn't Dudley have started stuff like the tea back then? Instead it's only obvious in DH--sort of like how Harry can suddenly see Thestrels not at the end of GoF, but in OotP.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Swythyv's come up with a lovely explanation for why Harry didn't see the Thestrals at the end of GoF. She just posted a new essay on Thestrals over in HP_essays.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Thanks, I'll check that out. That one really doesn't bother me, actually. I can accept JKR's explanation that it hadn't "sunk in yet" even if I don't really think that's the reason. But they so are obviously following a schedule. Like in this book I swear there's parts where people can't get a chance to talk for weeks even though they're all cooped up in a small house. Or Harry and Hermione have to practice apparition for a *month* so that they can hit GH at Christmas.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

The whole problem seems to be that she's run out of plausible excuses for why her characters *don't* do things. She seems to *want* them to just sit like lumps and emote until she tells them to do something.

That's no way to tell a story.

[va32h.livejournal.com]

The strange thing is that she really didn't used to be like that.

Compare Harry and Ron's quick minds and resourcefulness in PS with the way they behave in DH; as you say, "sitting like lumps" until Hermione does everything for them. Harry has gotten progressively stupider from OoTP on.

What the hell happened?

It's as if Rowling found some new religion or philosophy between GoF and OotP which preaches that the only path to salvation is through utter passivity.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Yes. Suddenly *everyone* is sitting about like lumps. Even retroactively. Albus and Tom in particular.

(I guess that's why Sirius *had* to die in OotP. It would have been impossible to make him sit still.)

[aasaylva.livejournal.com]

Another example is Harry's crush on Ginny. She gets her personality transplantation between GoF and OotP, but he needs more than a year to actually react to it. Maybe this delay is due to Evans genes...

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

And iirc, even after he's noticed it it never comes up for the weeks he's living with her at her house for Christmas.

[aasaylva.livejournal.com]

Well, the monster needs incubation time!

[go-back-chief.livejournal.com]

EXACTLY! That's why it feels so especially unrealistic; he noticed her personality transplant in OotP and even comments on it, but he doesn't fall in love with her until a year later! It doesn't make sense in any way, shape or form.

[kaskait.livejournal.com]

She took a lot of her plot lines from Alchemy theories. Alchemical works must adhere to a very set schedule in both the solar and lunar calendar. Hence HP actions taking place at certain times of the year and all the waiting around in between.

She just should have jettisoned this part of her plan, it but braces on her. Ones that she didn't need and didn't have the ability to overcome or work-around.

[aasaylva.livejournal.com]

Or at least use! The whole alchemy theories fell flat anyway - so there shouldn't have been any reason why she adhered to the mere structure till the bitter end.

[kaskait.livejournal.com]

I think the structure overwhelmed her and she couldn't figure out a way to make it all work.

It was why she was so hell bent on 7 books when it all could have been wrapped up a lot sooner.

Alchemy

[cressida0201.livejournal.com]

She took a lot of her plot lines from Alchemy theories.

Was that ever proven/did she ever admit to it, or was it just a guess?

Alchemical works must adhere to a very set schedule in both the solar and lunar calendar.

There's a built-in excuse right there for the timeframe of her books; all she had to do was use it!

Re: Alchemy

[kaskait.livejournal.com]

In one of her many interviews she admitted that she studied a lot of Alchemy books and essays. The symbols are in there but the problem is is that there are so many theories, the main one being Rosicrucianism. It is kind of all mashed together in the series. Alchemy does stress love but it clashes with her belief that people are born innately good or bad.

What a mess.

She did adhere to the time schedule. She should have just thrown the whole thing out.

Or she plans to write more books in that universe. Therefore Lupin's child is important,especially the date he was born. Sigh. I hope she doesn't go there.

Re: Alchemy

[tdotm.livejournal.com]

Did she actually say that she thought people are born innately good or bad? Then what was all that chat about being made by your choices? That's by far the better attitude.

Or have people presumed she thinks that, because nobody ever develops or grows during the story? If you start bad, you end bad and so on? Unless you were Peter Pettigrew and that change happened off screen - like 75% of the most interesting events.

I think once the films have finished and the hype finally dies down, these books will not stand the test of time. A shame, because the idea, and first few books were incredible.

She'd better get that sequel out quick before more and more people start realising how they been suckered.

Re: Alchemy

[kaskait.livejournal.com]

Did she actually say that she thought people are born innately good or bad? Then what was all that chat about being made by your choices? That's by far the better attitude.

She never stated that in any interview. She always stressed choices.

However, as many have stated before and better than I can, the books don't really show choice consequences on their own terms. The choices the characters make just highlight their innate goodness/badness. Therefore any choice Harry makes is good because he is innately good and has love in his heart. Anything Tom did or would do would always reflect his bad soul.

Re: Alchemy

[cressida0201.livejournal.com]

How recent was that interview? I may be cynical, but I wonder if she decided to do this after the alchemy theories had already been put forth. It would explain why she did some things like pair Harry with Ginny, which completely flies in the face of the alchemical rules--or so I hear from people who have looked these things up, anyway.

Re: Alchemy

[kaskait.livejournal.com]

I think it was in one of her interviews right before the release of DH.

I would have said the same but the alchemy symbols were there from book 1. She was using them in her own way. Hence the changes to some of the motifs.

Usually the Harry and Hermione type of characters end up together. But JKR preferred Harry/Ginny. But that is not to say that she didn't have a symbolic marriage between Harry/Hermione. They were partners almost all the way to the end until Harry had to stand on his own. After their final partnership they went to their respective partners. So she followed the metaphors until a certain point.