HBP Chapter Three

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

*This is the chapter where Dumbledore’s a total asshole, isn’t it? ::sigh:: ETA: Leading up to the big revelation of his central character, no doubt!

*Harry snores! And he sleeps with his mouth open! His room’s a mess! He’s so human and flawed—get it?

*Btw, I’m just going to assume that although he’s waiting for Dumbledore to pick him up he hasn’t showered in four days.

*If anybody wants to have a quick argument about “fug” and whether it’s a typo or a real word, and whether if it’s a real word it’s the right word to use here, here’s your time. Harry’s sleeping. He won’t mind.

*I know I already mentioned him being a slob but…apple cores? That’s gross. I’ll bet there’s owl droppings all over everything too. ETA: Owls don't leave droppings. They make pellets! Somebody corrected me about that and now I pass on the wisdom. Sorry, owl family!

*So the prophecy is fabled? People didn’t know about it before? Why not, since Dumbledore helpfully had it officially placed in the MoM? Isn’t this the type of thing everyone is supposed to find out about, like Harry and the Philosopher’s Stone?

*ETA: Now that the series is over does anyone really have a sense of how Harry is/was perceived by the WW at large?

*Some are going so far as to call Harry Potter “The Chosen One” because being wizards we don’t know that’s Keanu Reeves. And that it’s a really bad cliché. ETA: Perhaps they stole the title from a Muggle movie. It was so inferior they had to make it better by making it Wizard.

*Scrimgeor has a “ravaged face.” This is a world where pretty much everything can be cured, yet we’ve got all these Gryffindor men walking around with scarred faces. Don’t tell me that’s not intentional.

*So…does Augusta Longbottom think Neville is a friend of Harry’s because Neville pathetically talks about him all the time, or is she, like everyone else, just desperate to drop Harry’s name? ETA: It really is a happy ending for Neville that he probably spends the rest of his life distantly approved of by Harry Potter. Enjoy that mild approval, Neville. You earned it.

*The Ministry has come up with tons of new security for Hogwarts. They do not know a man is coming to destroy their petty plans for protection. His house is Slytherin and his name is Señor Draco. ETA: Next year access to Hogwarts is pretty much universal. Go figure.

*Dear Harry, if it is convenient to you… Oh man, Albus is laying it on thick. Like he cares if it’s convenient to anyone.

*Harry had not packed. And before you criticize him at all he didn’t pack because he’s an orphan and doesn’t trust anyone to really care about him or for anything to work out well ever. There. Bet you feel badly now for suggesting he might have packed.

*He’s also completely forgotten to warn the Dursleys. Also because he’s an orphan and...well, because it’ll be funnier if the Dursleys get to gape when Albus shows up.

*Harry notes that Vernon can tell Dumbledore is a man difficult to bully. Somehow he manages to do this without considering that this is because Dumbledore is a bigger bully.

*And so begins Dumbledore’s plan of “Bait the Muggles to show what a great guy I really am to Harry so maybe he forgets that I didn’t care how the Muggles treated him until I needed him.”

*ETA: Oh man, Dumbledore must be getting such a thrill out of this scene. It all makes sense now, doesn't it? He's been given a semi-justified reason to show Muggles that Magic is Might. Then he'll go home and play it over in his mind as a sex fantasy. (A naughty GAY sex fantasy!)

*Btw, the Dursleys are all still ugly. So I guess they’re still bad people.

*Sadly, I find myself getting my hopes up that the Dursleys will get a chance to show Harry how little they care that Dumbledore has died next year, but presumably Ron and Hermione will descend on their house and move in to bully them for weeks in his place. This will go over with all the readers who haven’t figured out they themselves are Muggles yet.

*ETA: Don't know how I couldn't have seen fanboy!Dudley coming.

*The glasses knocking against the Dursleys heads makes me so angry, and makes Dumbledore such a dick, it makes me want to climb into the book and tell him off. And push Ginny out a window. Even though she hasn’t appeared yet.

*ETA: Because it can't be said enough: Magic is might. But at least he's not indulging in homosexual sex here, so he's still good!

*Harry couldn’t suppress the suspicion that Dumbledore is enjoying himself with his Muggle-baiting. Well, of course he is. Here he has to be a good liberal all the time and pretend to think well of Muggles. You can imagine his joy when he finds a family of Muggles who have annoyed him so he can magically bully them while telling himself it’s not anything like Death Eaters doing it. Like the Weasleys, Dumbledore has earned himself some righteous Muggle-baiting through all his lip service to Muggle Protection.

*ETA: A year later, when Harry is freaking out over the possibility that Dumbledore had a life a century before meeting him, he will never that I recall use this scene to "prove" to himself that he really was about Muggle domination all along. Because come on, they really did deserve it.

*Dumbledore says Sirius's will was discovered. Could that sound more fake? How long did it take you to write that will before you discovered it, Big D? And he left Harry everything, you say? And you'll take care of that for him?

*ETA: The MoM takes care of Albus's will and Albus takes care of everybody else's. Harry's not going to get to actually read Sirius's will or anything, even the parts relating to him. Anything Sirius might have had to say to Harry can be relayed through Dumbledore (probably cutting out anything irrelevent, i.e., personal).

*ETA: You can tell Sirius isn't amazingly clever like Dumbledore for the way he just leaves Harry all his possessions including his slave. As opposed to, like, leaving him a pez dispenser, a drill bit and a copy of the Catcher in the Rye and letting Harry figure out he's inherited everything from those clues.

*More gold for Harry—phew! The world needs more heirs to fortunes who actually deserve it.

*By the way, Lupin’s been reduced to donating pints of blood for money, but I’m sure he’d want Sirius’ money to go to you. Rich Pureblood money should stay in the family. ETA: Seriously, why does Remus feel inadequate as a parent? It's a mystery!

*Vernon reminds us how awful he is by looking greedy at the idea of Harry being left a house. Harry, naturally, accepts his second fortune in gold with dignity by not caring at all. Unlike, say, crass, Muggle ME, who would be wondering if I could pay off my student loans. This is why money should stay with money. Thank God Ron isn't here.

*Now that Sirius is dead, Harry is free to love him the way he knows best, by making wild, violent gestures in the direction of his enemies. When he was alive he had to, like, speak to him and stuff and he didn’t care for that.

*"It would have been better manners to drink it, you know." Fuck you Dumbledore. Seriously. Fuck you with your own dead black hand. *pushes Ginny out the window because she would think this was hilarious.*

*ETA: It really is creepy the way that "manners" in the WW really are just ways of bullying and intimidating people. They have no concept of what they're really supposed to do, which is make other people feel welcome and comfortable.

*Kreacher’s back. ETA: Enjoy him while he lasts. He and Dudley are about to drink the Kool-Aid that makes them Harry sychophants. Actually, maybe it's not so much Kool-Aid as golden Harry Polyjuice.

*Petunia shrieks. Nothing this filthy has entered her house in living memory. Um, I beg to differ. Harry lives right upstairs.

*So if Sirius hadn’t left a will Kreacher would have gone to Bellatrix? That was pretty stupid on the Order’s part, wasn’t it? Or is Dumbledore lying because he wants Harry to have Kreacher for some reason? When in doubt, it’s usually best to assume DD is lying.

*So. Harry’s a slave-owner now. I’m sure Hermione will have something to say about that. After two books of non-stop SPEW it’s sure to just come to a head in this book. Funny how it doesn’t enter Harry’s head here. Could this be the shape of things to come?

*ETA: There are no words for my response to this whole storyline in the books. By which I mean there are tons of words compulsively written by me all over the 'net.

*Dumbledore helpfully suggests Harry could let Kreacher work for him. So Dumbledore gets another house elf out of the bargain. Always gets something out of the deal, does Dumbledore.

*Hagrid would be delighted to have Buckbeak live with him. I’m sure he’s learned his lesson about being recklessly stupid with animals. That is, he’s learned that if other people are recklessly stupid enough to get bitten by them, it’s not his fault.

*The Ministry would never guess Buckbeak is the same hippogriff they once sentenced to death why, exactly? I would think it would be obvious to anyone. Do all hippogriffs look alike to them? Speciests.

*ETA: The Ministry would never guess because they know that was the plot of PoA and is no longer needed.

*Harry finds his invisibility cloak under the bed. Dude, what did he do in that room in two weeks?

*ETA: I was going to say "Wouldn't it have been bad luck if Harry had actually lost his invisibility cloak the many times he was careless with it since it turned out to be a Deathly "still the stupidest name ever" Hallow? Then I remembered that if Harry had actually lost his cloak Hermione he might have had to actively search for it himself in DH and we couldn't have that.

*Since this is the last time Dumbledore will be speaking with the Dursleys, he takes the opportunity to make a big ridiculous speech about how their treating Harry badly was an affront to him. I think he waits until after Kreacher’s gone to do this because Kreacher (ETA: at this point in the story, natch) would have totally called him on the hypocrisy.

*ETA: None of which is as crazy as the speech Dumbledore probably *wants* to make here about how Muggles are allowed on this planet because of the good will of Wizards like him.

*He also zings the Dursleys on their horrible upbringing of Dudley. Trivia question: which of these two cousins is going to eviscerate a fellow student before year’s end?

*ETA: Dudley's eventual ability to recognize Harry's superiority is of course a result of Harry's presence in his life (or the state of his soul at birth) and not the Dursleys' parenting.

*Dumbledore says he and Harry are now stepping out into the night to pursue that flighty temptress, adventure. Amazingly, Harry does not turn back around and remain with the Dursleys on the grounds of extreme gayness. ETA: ::sigh:: That really is Dumbledore being gay, isn't it.



Designated Hero
See that guy teasing the family like a cross between the bully football player and the Mafia don intimidating witnesses? That’s our epitome of goodness.

Informed Attributes
He’s our epitome of goodness because of how much he cared about Harry being brought up in a loving home. He cares enough to scold his abusers at least two weeks before Harry’s never going to see them again.

IITS
Blood doesn’t matter. Except that actually it’s being with family that’s protected Harry all these years. Except that his real family are the Weasleys who love him. Except that he has to live here…look, IITS, okay?

Superfluous Racking
Dumbledore’s doing this throughout the scene because he’s such a badass with his wand and look at how scared the Dursleys are.

Final score: 4

p.s. I feel funny about using this mood. I almost feel like it should be retired in honor of potterstinks

Comments

[tdotm.livejournal.com]

Have I missed something about Ginny being pushed out of the window? I don’t care, please feel free to go ahead - just make sure she never gets up again. She‘s my single least favourite character in Half Blood Prince - and boy, is that a stiff contest.

I wish Kreacher had been working for Bellatrix. I wouldn’t have minded a small amount of camping if Bellatrix had attacked them in Grimmauld Place . Or Kreacher was helping Draco with the Vanishing Cabinet in the way Dobby always helped Harry. Or something extra of interest happened in this book. I liked it at the time, but so much filler!

It makes sense that Harry was the ‘Chosen One’, because he sure as hell didn’t *earn* his position of the Saviour of the World.

I couldn’t care less about the Dursleys. (Though Dudley’s about face really pissed me off) I’ve worked with abused kids, and that really affects my opinion. If Dumbledore could give them a taste of their own medicine - good. Harry’s a little bastard now, but just because I hate him, doesn't mean I can't hate them as well! I don’t care if it’s hypocritical of Dd, we all know what a git in velvet clothing he was anyway.

On that subject, I never understood what the hell JKR was trying to do with Dumbledore. By DH she genuinely seemed to think that we all still saw him as the sweet, charming, kindly Wilfred Hyde-White grandfather figure we saw in the Philosopher’s Stone. In fact he appeared more manipulative and ambivalent as the series went on. I thought that made sense as Harry was getting older. It wasn’t that Dumbles was changing, but that Harry was starting to understand him better - see him more clearly. (Because he’s just *so* perceptive.)

Dd was already obviously more complicated than he originally seemed. I liked him being a little open to interpretation, but then DH introduced all that ridiculous over the top nonsense about Grindelwald. It’s like the Golden Polyjuice. She just hits you over the head with the anvil to make her point. Subtle - not so much. (I’ll bet Harry’s poo smells of roses. Or lilys!)

Dd could have been planning his year out with Elphias Doge, when he had to step in and take care of the strange sister. He ignored her when he should have been watching her, she fell down the well and died. The End. Still reason to feel guilty and change the path of his life, without the ‘made for Hollywood’ over the top, don’t know when to stop, passion for the Hitler-a-like.

That way, we wouldn’t be asking why it took so many years to confront to confront Grindelwald. How many people died in the early 20th century because Dd was unwilling to confront his one true love? True, if Dumbledore knew Grindlewald had the Elder Wand, it’d explain why he didn’t confront him until he had to - it’d make sense. But JKR was carefully quiet on that point. Of course, we wouldn’t understand how he could beat the owner of the infallible Elder Wand……oh, I give UP!

[sunnyskywalker]

Dumbledore's DH backstory could have worked out just fine if Harry had realized that he had to figure out what was right for himself instead of blindly trusting anyone who had been kind to him to be "good guys," and that the wizarding world would need lots of work even after Voldemort was dead... but no. *sigh*

Rita might have guessed right about Grindlewald holding up a white handkerchief and coming quietly. Maybe Dumbledore held off because Grindlewald was willing to use the Elder Wand against him until something woke his conscience (or he just realize he was losing and wanted to give up while he had a chance at amnesty), and then he wrote Dumbledore and offered to give himself up? But that would mean Dumbledore was never the master of the Elder Wand, which would mean the mastery couldn't pass to Draco and then Harry, which means... oh, I give up too.

[aasaylva.livejournal.com]

It makes sense that Harry was the ‘Chosen One’, because he sure as hell didn’t *earn* his position of the Saviour of the World.
FTW!

Totally agree on the Dumbledore issue as well. I really think she didn't have a clue what she wanted to say (just like with the tolerance issue). It sounds like: "You have to question authority! And everybody else who does it, is BAD. So, after you have questioned it a bit, you have to come back and go on believing blindly."

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, Ginny never did get pushed out a window. I just wanted to do it to her all through this book.:-)

It makes sense that Harry was the ‘Chosen One’, because he sure as hell didn’t *earn* his position of the Saviour of the World.

Which makes him far more worthy than he would have been if he'd earned it, I'm sure!

I couldn’t care less about the Dursleys. (Though Dudley’s about face really pissed me off) I’ve worked with abused kids, and that really affects my opinion.

Oh, I don't particularly care about the Dursleys themselves being mistreated either. I care only in that as a Muggle myself I know this is how I would be treated if I stepped out of line--with "stepping out of line" not having to include any sort of abuse.

And even more so what bugs me is that Dumbledore tacitly approved of their abuse for years and is now swooping in like the big savior when Harry is on his way out the door anyway. It seems like Dumbledore's just amusing himself and making himself look good to Harry rather than stopping the abuse. If Sirius was picking on them it would come across to me as Sirius being truly angry at them mistreating a child. With Dumbledore it's like...dude, you knew about the abuse and were the one keeping him here and not making anything better when Harry was at his most helpless. And in the last book you dismissed Harry's state as just being a little less fed than you would have liked!

But yeah, the Grindelwald stuff is still odd since it basically has nothing to do with Harry's story. So much so that again, it's not really in the book. According to the book it might as well have been the story you suggest here. Grindelwald just adds the flash or something. Or one last bit of imagined past conflict. (He didn't just defeat the guy to get the Elder Wand--it was PERSONAL! Meanwhile the Harry/Snape conflict fizzles to nothing.)

[montavilla.livejournal.com]

I remember before DH came out wondering if JKR had made DD such an asshole so that we wouldn't mind so much when he died.

That was my theory, too, about Sirius. By the time Sirius died in OotP, he was so unbearable as a godfather, that it was hard to really feel bad about his death. Instead, I felt bad about his loss of power.

But everything about Dumbledore sucks in HBP, doesn't it? Starting with this scene. I never minded seeing the Dursleys getting beaten up before, because they weren't exactly characters... they were aliens from a Roald Dahl book. But when I read this the first time, my thoughts were, "Wow. I'll bet she wrote this to answer all fans who want to see the Dursleys get their comeuppance" and "Gee, Dumbledore is a jerk." And, "He must be dying or he'd do this whole big speech next year."

Everything else in this chapter pales for me. I can't get excited by Harry's lack of hygiene or the slave issue, because for me, Dumbledore's huge assholery blots out everything. He's the one who left Harry there in the first place. He basically told Harry in OotP that he'd been keeping tabs on him--if not stuck a magical nanny-cam in the house. At the very least he knew for five years that the Dursleys were doing things like locking Harry in a cupboard. But he did nothing.

Then he comes in to lecture them on their lack of parenting skills. Cheap, Dumbledore. Very cheap.

In any other story in the world, that scene would have made the hero instantly sympathize with his dreadful relatives. You know? Like the way that Draco's insults made Harry bond with Ron? If Dumbledore had pulled that stunt with little Harry, Harry would stood up and said, "Thank you, I think I can choose my own relatives" and showed Dumbledore out. The stuff Hagrid does it different, somewhow--probably because Hagrid didn't know what was going on and his reactions are genuine.

Dumbledore did know what the Dursley were like. Obviously. He not only knows how they treated Harry, but how they treated Dudley. So, his lecture is planned and manipulative. And three years later, it still make me so angry that's hard to type a response.

It disgusts me that Dumbledore was put into a position of modeling behavior for two generations. Now I'm beginning to think of Lucius as a hero for trying to get him sacked.

[cressida0201.livejournal.com]

Still reason to feel guilty and change the path of his life...

Again, I'll probably do my full-scale rant on this when we reach the relevant portion of DH, but personally, I'm tired of guilt over past mistakes as the motivator for "good" characters to be good. I was really annoyed that JKR chose to go that route with DD's backstory.

Of course, we wouldn’t understand how he could beat the owner of the infallible Elder Wand……oh, I give UP!

I only managed to get through DH once, so a lot of the details escape me. Can anyone remind me how DD was supposed to have acquired the Elder Wand?

[intotheaether.livejournal.com]

It's never properly explained, iirc, which means, I'm sure, that we're supposed to infer that DD got the wand because of his pure heart.

Personally, I prefer to believe Grindelwald really did "conjure up a handkerchief and come quietly," and DD stole the wand from him when Grindelwald wasn't looking. I'm sincerely trying to get my mind out of the gutter.