Deathly Hallows Chapter 2
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deathtocapslockDeathly Hallows: Chapter 2
In Memoriam
This chapter starts with the bang-o sentence: “Harry was bleeding.” Way to get our attention! Unfortunately, we’ll eventually find out that Harry is bleeding because he’s an idiot.
Humorously, Harry steps on a teacup placed just outside his room. I think it would have been funnier if Harry had been barefoot. Then he’d be bleeding in two places and he’d have to hop to the bathroom. Then, maybe he could lose his balance on the slippery tiles and end up with his head in the toilet. I’m really surprised Rowling missed his opportunity.
Instead, Harry merely picks up the pieces of broken teacup and throws them into a bin, speculating that the cup is Cousin Dudley’s “clever” idea of a trap.
I’d like to take a moment here to comment on Dudley’s devolution as a villain in the series. In PS/SS, Dudley was mercilessly beating on Harry and terrorizing all the other kids at school from even considering Harry as friend material. He was then punished with by karma and Hagrid with a pig’s tail. And after that he… what does he do, exactly? Nothing much to Harry as I recall. In CoS and PoA, he’s just there, enjoying the adoration of adults who dislike Harry. In GoF, he’s fat. In OotP, he’s shaped up and he’s bullying other kids—but not Harry. In HBP, his only crime is to refuse an alcoholic drink (which, in our country would be considered responsible behavior for an underage boy).
So, in DH, Dudley is reduced to placing teacups outside Harry’s door in a vain attempt to express his admiration. Something which Harry, who is apparently blind to Dudley’s actual mindset, interprets as a hostile action. No, Harry. Dudley isn’t your enemy. He’s your House Elf.
But, then Harry is distracted by the thought that he has four whole days until he can do magic. Not that his magic can heal anything. Even the narrator on Harry’s shoulder thinks he’s lame for never taking a Wizard’s First Aid class.
That should have been one of the elective courses, don’t you think? They could have called it the “Spells That Aren’t as Flashy as Turning Hedgehogs into Pin Cushions But a Whole Lot More Useful” class.
As for me, I’m distracted with wondering why Dudley didn’t set the teacup on an end table or something. Or maybe knock on the door so that Harry would get the tea before it got cold. But then, he’s never been portrayed as being very clever.
You know, I’m not trying to be mean about Harry... he is the hero and I’m trying as hard as I can to like him, but I can’t get over this next bit. We’re told that in six years, Harry’s never really unpacked his trunk completely, but always left a layer of “mulch” at the bottom. Is this a boy thing? I’m a really messy person, but I unpack my bags when I get home. And, if there’s broken glass in it, I clean it out. Even if it means lugging in the vacuum cleaner to my room. It’s not like I have this handy little stick on me at all times that will magically clean stuff.
Also, if I cut myself on something embedded in “mulch,” I put Bactine on the cut. Or iodine. Or clean it out with alcohol. Just because you’re a wizard doesn’t mean you can’t get infected.
Oddly, Harry thinks that his uncle and aunt will probably burn his things in the middle of the night, because they are so anti-magic. He’s obviously forgetting that his aunt and uncle are supposed to leave in an hour or so for parts unknown. The last thing they’d do is lug his stuff along with them for the pleasure of setting it on fire.
Among the things Harry is leaving behind are his school robes. What he’s keeping is his Muggle clothing. This sounds like he might be thinking of hiding out in the Muggle world. Or, that Rowling has finally owned up to the fact that Wizard clothing is stupid.
Harry packs the Marauder’s Map, not that the map will have any purpose on his Quest.
He also packs a small fragment of mirror (which he cut his finger on) and the locket which “cost” Dumbledore’s life. It seems that Harry values things by how much pain they have caused him. Or by how important they are to eventually wrapping up the plot in a surprising twist!
Meanwhile, Hedwig is pretending to sleep because she hates Harry. I’m not making it up. That’s in the book.
Hehe. Harry finds the newspaper he was looking for by remembering the short mention of Charity Burbage’s resignation on the front page. Too late, J.R! You’re placing the Chekhovian gun on the mantelpiece after it was fired!
In my book, this chapter takes up approximately 16 pages. Of those, 11 pages are filled with stuff about Albus Dumbledore’s life. Didn’t we have an entire chapter in the last book dedicated to his funeral? There wasn’t this much coverage of the John Kennedy assassination! (On the other hand, there was some effort to actually catch the man who murdered Kennedy, so maybe it balances out.)
The first article, by Elphias Doge goes something like this: I met Dumbledore when he was eleven and it was awesome! He awesome to me and awesome to Muggles. He was an awesome student and when we graduated, we were going to go on an awesome trip! But his mom died, so he didn’t go. But he was still awesome! He went on to get an awesome job as a teacher! Then he had an awesome duel and even more awesomely turned down the job as Minister of Magic! Wasn’t he awesome?
Dumbledore’s defeat of Grindelwald is considered a turning point in wizarding history on a par with the enactment of the Statute of Secrecy or the downfall of Voldemort. Consequently, it was never included in the history class at Hogwarts.
Harry feels ashamed about how little he knew Dumbledore. I think Harry’s giving himself a bum rap here. He tried to ask a personal question once when he was eleven and even then he could tell Dumbledore was lying.
Besides, Harry never even asked anyone about his parents. Nor does he know the names of Hermione’s parents. So, you know, asking personal questions isn’t Harry’s strong suit.
Then, Harry notices that Rita Skeeter is being interviewed about her upcoming book on Dumbledore’s life. Feeling the need to become enraged, he decides to read through a six-page article of “lies” about his beloved mentor.
By the way, nobody in the U.S. would ever write an interview like this (what with the descriptions of Rita tossing her hair back and such). Is this a common style for British tabloids?
Rita promises her readers that there’s a lot of nastiness in the Dumbledore family—much worse that Aberforth’s illegal goat charms. I don’t know how much nastier you can get than screwing goats. Maybe that isn’t such a big thing in the wizarding world, when you have half-giants and half-goblins running around. But it puts a whole new light on the Blast-Ended Skrewts, doesn’t it?
Rita brings up a controversial take on the famous Grindelwald duel, declaring that Grindelwald basically gave up. I wonder if this is a dropped part of the story. Why make the duel controversial, unless it has some bearing on the Elder Wand storyline? But, since we never find out how the duel went down, this never really goes anywhere and just becomes part of the whole “Was Dumbledore Just a Big Phony?” debate.
Rita goes on to insinuating that there was something “sinister” in Dumbledore’s relationship with Harry. Not that gay = pedophile by any means, but this might have been a good place to bring up the fact that Dumbledore was gay. I find Rita rather restrained for not mentioning it.
Or maybe Doge should have, just to enhance Dumbledore’s awesomeness. After all, Dumbledore appears to be the only gay person in the entire history of Wizardry.
Revolted and repulsed, Harry balls up the newspaper and throws it with all his force at the bin. Bwahaha. Nothing funnier than someone trying to throw a balled-up newspaper with force. I think that’s the nerdiest thing Harry’s ever done.
In his rage, Harry picks up the fragment of mirror and sees a flash of blue—just like Dumbledore’s eyes! He is despondent at the thought that Dumbledore’s blue eyes will never pierce him again. But he does get the consolation of having the mirror cut his finger again as he picks it up. See? They did pierce you after all!
Fan Service:
Shout-outs to Draco’s badge from GoF and Ron’s Sneakoscope from PoA.
Sirius’s two-way mirror finally makes it return!
References to Dumbledore/Harry slash! (Should that be Humbledore?)
Fan Slappage:
No, Harry can’t use the mirror to communicate with Sirius in the afterlife.
DVD Extras:
INT. DAY – GREENHOUSE NUMBER ONE
A first-year student with a pock-marked face listlessly prunes a Flutterby bush. In the background, other students can be seen working on other bushes in groups of twos and threes.
A boy, wearing the Gryffindor colors approaches. The sun, shining behind this head, turns his red hair into a golden nimbus.
GRYFFINDOR
Hullo. You look as though you could use a partner. I’m Albus. Albus Dumbledore.
The listless student, ELPHIAS DOGE, squints up at Albus.
ELPHIAS
Elphias Doge. No one wants to work with me. They’re afraid I’m catching.
ALBUS
That’s silly. Dragon Pox is only contagious for the first two weeks.
He takes out a pair of secaturs and squats down. They begin working on the bush. After a moment:
ELPHIAS
Oh, I say! You’re Dumbledore. Is it true that your father is in Azkaban?
Albus nods.
ELPHIAS
I’m sure it wasn’t as bad as the papers made it sound.
ALBUS
It was.
ELPHIAS
Oh, sorry.
There is an awkward silence. Finally, Albus sits back on his heels:
ALBUS
Well, that’s a jolly good job, if I do say so myself.
They smile shyly at each other.
ALBUS (cont’d)
So… shall we go wank off behind the shed for a bit?
ELPHIAS
(beaming) Oh, I say! Rather!
FADE OUT
In Memoriam
This chapter starts with the bang-o sentence: “Harry was bleeding.” Way to get our attention! Unfortunately, we’ll eventually find out that Harry is bleeding because he’s an idiot.
Humorously, Harry steps on a teacup placed just outside his room. I think it would have been funnier if Harry had been barefoot. Then he’d be bleeding in two places and he’d have to hop to the bathroom. Then, maybe he could lose his balance on the slippery tiles and end up with his head in the toilet. I’m really surprised Rowling missed his opportunity.
Instead, Harry merely picks up the pieces of broken teacup and throws them into a bin, speculating that the cup is Cousin Dudley’s “clever” idea of a trap.
I’d like to take a moment here to comment on Dudley’s devolution as a villain in the series. In PS/SS, Dudley was mercilessly beating on Harry and terrorizing all the other kids at school from even considering Harry as friend material. He was then punished with by karma and Hagrid with a pig’s tail. And after that he… what does he do, exactly? Nothing much to Harry as I recall. In CoS and PoA, he’s just there, enjoying the adoration of adults who dislike Harry. In GoF, he’s fat. In OotP, he’s shaped up and he’s bullying other kids—but not Harry. In HBP, his only crime is to refuse an alcoholic drink (which, in our country would be considered responsible behavior for an underage boy).
So, in DH, Dudley is reduced to placing teacups outside Harry’s door in a vain attempt to express his admiration. Something which Harry, who is apparently blind to Dudley’s actual mindset, interprets as a hostile action. No, Harry. Dudley isn’t your enemy. He’s your House Elf.
But, then Harry is distracted by the thought that he has four whole days until he can do magic. Not that his magic can heal anything. Even the narrator on Harry’s shoulder thinks he’s lame for never taking a Wizard’s First Aid class.
That should have been one of the elective courses, don’t you think? They could have called it the “Spells That Aren’t as Flashy as Turning Hedgehogs into Pin Cushions But a Whole Lot More Useful” class.
As for me, I’m distracted with wondering why Dudley didn’t set the teacup on an end table or something. Or maybe knock on the door so that Harry would get the tea before it got cold. But then, he’s never been portrayed as being very clever.
You know, I’m not trying to be mean about Harry... he is the hero and I’m trying as hard as I can to like him, but I can’t get over this next bit. We’re told that in six years, Harry’s never really unpacked his trunk completely, but always left a layer of “mulch” at the bottom. Is this a boy thing? I’m a really messy person, but I unpack my bags when I get home. And, if there’s broken glass in it, I clean it out. Even if it means lugging in the vacuum cleaner to my room. It’s not like I have this handy little stick on me at all times that will magically clean stuff.
Also, if I cut myself on something embedded in “mulch,” I put Bactine on the cut. Or iodine. Or clean it out with alcohol. Just because you’re a wizard doesn’t mean you can’t get infected.
Oddly, Harry thinks that his uncle and aunt will probably burn his things in the middle of the night, because they are so anti-magic. He’s obviously forgetting that his aunt and uncle are supposed to leave in an hour or so for parts unknown. The last thing they’d do is lug his stuff along with them for the pleasure of setting it on fire.
Among the things Harry is leaving behind are his school robes. What he’s keeping is his Muggle clothing. This sounds like he might be thinking of hiding out in the Muggle world. Or, that Rowling has finally owned up to the fact that Wizard clothing is stupid.
Harry packs the Marauder’s Map, not that the map will have any purpose on his Quest.
He also packs a small fragment of mirror (which he cut his finger on) and the locket which “cost” Dumbledore’s life. It seems that Harry values things by how much pain they have caused him. Or by how important they are to eventually wrapping up the plot in a surprising twist!
Meanwhile, Hedwig is pretending to sleep because she hates Harry. I’m not making it up. That’s in the book.
Hehe. Harry finds the newspaper he was looking for by remembering the short mention of Charity Burbage’s resignation on the front page. Too late, J.R! You’re placing the Chekhovian gun on the mantelpiece after it was fired!
In my book, this chapter takes up approximately 16 pages. Of those, 11 pages are filled with stuff about Albus Dumbledore’s life. Didn’t we have an entire chapter in the last book dedicated to his funeral? There wasn’t this much coverage of the John Kennedy assassination! (On the other hand, there was some effort to actually catch the man who murdered Kennedy, so maybe it balances out.)
The first article, by Elphias Doge goes something like this: I met Dumbledore when he was eleven and it was awesome! He awesome to me and awesome to Muggles. He was an awesome student and when we graduated, we were going to go on an awesome trip! But his mom died, so he didn’t go. But he was still awesome! He went on to get an awesome job as a teacher! Then he had an awesome duel and even more awesomely turned down the job as Minister of Magic! Wasn’t he awesome?
Dumbledore’s defeat of Grindelwald is considered a turning point in wizarding history on a par with the enactment of the Statute of Secrecy or the downfall of Voldemort. Consequently, it was never included in the history class at Hogwarts.
Harry feels ashamed about how little he knew Dumbledore. I think Harry’s giving himself a bum rap here. He tried to ask a personal question once when he was eleven and even then he could tell Dumbledore was lying.
Besides, Harry never even asked anyone about his parents. Nor does he know the names of Hermione’s parents. So, you know, asking personal questions isn’t Harry’s strong suit.
Then, Harry notices that Rita Skeeter is being interviewed about her upcoming book on Dumbledore’s life. Feeling the need to become enraged, he decides to read through a six-page article of “lies” about his beloved mentor.
By the way, nobody in the U.S. would ever write an interview like this (what with the descriptions of Rita tossing her hair back and such). Is this a common style for British tabloids?
Rita promises her readers that there’s a lot of nastiness in the Dumbledore family—much worse that Aberforth’s illegal goat charms. I don’t know how much nastier you can get than screwing goats. Maybe that isn’t such a big thing in the wizarding world, when you have half-giants and half-goblins running around. But it puts a whole new light on the Blast-Ended Skrewts, doesn’t it?
Rita brings up a controversial take on the famous Grindelwald duel, declaring that Grindelwald basically gave up. I wonder if this is a dropped part of the story. Why make the duel controversial, unless it has some bearing on the Elder Wand storyline? But, since we never find out how the duel went down, this never really goes anywhere and just becomes part of the whole “Was Dumbledore Just a Big Phony?” debate.
Rita goes on to insinuating that there was something “sinister” in Dumbledore’s relationship with Harry. Not that gay = pedophile by any means, but this might have been a good place to bring up the fact that Dumbledore was gay. I find Rita rather restrained for not mentioning it.
Or maybe Doge should have, just to enhance Dumbledore’s awesomeness. After all, Dumbledore appears to be the only gay person in the entire history of Wizardry.
Revolted and repulsed, Harry balls up the newspaper and throws it with all his force at the bin. Bwahaha. Nothing funnier than someone trying to throw a balled-up newspaper with force. I think that’s the nerdiest thing Harry’s ever done.
In his rage, Harry picks up the fragment of mirror and sees a flash of blue—just like Dumbledore’s eyes! He is despondent at the thought that Dumbledore’s blue eyes will never pierce him again. But he does get the consolation of having the mirror cut his finger again as he picks it up. See? They did pierce you after all!
Fan Service:
Shout-outs to Draco’s badge from GoF and Ron’s Sneakoscope from PoA.
Sirius’s two-way mirror finally makes it return!
References to Dumbledore/Harry slash! (Should that be Humbledore?)
Fan Slappage:
No, Harry can’t use the mirror to communicate with Sirius in the afterlife.
DVD Extras:
INT. DAY – GREENHOUSE NUMBER ONE
A first-year student with a pock-marked face listlessly prunes a Flutterby bush. In the background, other students can be seen working on other bushes in groups of twos and threes.
A boy, wearing the Gryffindor colors approaches. The sun, shining behind this head, turns his red hair into a golden nimbus.
GRYFFINDOR
Hullo. You look as though you could use a partner. I’m Albus. Albus Dumbledore.
The listless student, ELPHIAS DOGE, squints up at Albus.
ELPHIAS
Elphias Doge. No one wants to work with me. They’re afraid I’m catching.
ALBUS
That’s silly. Dragon Pox is only contagious for the first two weeks.
He takes out a pair of secaturs and squats down. They begin working on the bush. After a moment:
ELPHIAS
Oh, I say! You’re Dumbledore. Is it true that your father is in Azkaban?
Albus nods.
ELPHIAS
I’m sure it wasn’t as bad as the papers made it sound.
ALBUS
It was.
ELPHIAS
Oh, sorry.
There is an awkward silence. Finally, Albus sits back on his heels:
ALBUS
Well, that’s a jolly good job, if I do say so myself.
They smile shyly at each other.
ALBUS (cont’d)
So… shall we go wank off behind the shed for a bit?
ELPHIAS
(beaming) Oh, I say! Rather!
FADE OUT
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no subject
Date: 2009-05-22 07:00 pm (UTC)***Et tu, Brute? :-P
no subject
Date: 2009-05-22 08:31 pm (UTC)It *almost* reads as a satire. But not quite. And if it were intended as a satire you would expect it to be a bit more evident. And would a writer of Rowling's prominence even *be* trying to write a satire for 10-year-olds?
But if you do remember those pronouncements you can't help but wonder whether she made the boring bits of DHs so boring on purpose. Because it's obvious that the narration does throw us a few snide comments about the characters, in passing. Like that slap that here were three teenagers in a tent whose main acomplishment was to not be dead yet.
But a fair amount of her weaseling around was just trying to dodge the brickbats that she knew were going to be thrown. Like the pre-emptive statement that "some people will hate it".
The sad part is that -- if I'm not competely misremebering -- when she said something like she had done the best that she could with it, is that the statement was probably the unvarnished truth. Her original vision had gone *poof* back in GoF and what she was left with simply wasn't workable at the scale she found herself needing to work.
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-23 06:43 pm (UTC)School stories, I gather, are *very* widespread in Britain, and probably Europe as well. But while I *think* there were reprintings of some of those serieses in the US earlier than the mid '60s, I was completely unaware of them. I knew about Mary Poppins, and Dr Dolittle, and Beatrix Potter. But I never heard of school stories. I don't think I ever even heard of the genre of "school stories" let alone read one until I was well into High School (heard of that is, not read). Boarding schools showed up around the edges of other reissued British books, like C.S. Lewis's, but the stories that I encountered were never set *at* school. Even 'The Silver Chair' which launched from one cannot by any reasonable criterion be regarded as a school story.
The whole idea of sending your kids away from home to attend school for most of the year was totally foreign in Southern California in the '50s. Private day schools existed, certainly, usually for the hyper-religious, but a *boarding* school was something that no "normal" person had anything to do with. Such places were certainly were not attended by normal children, so why should anyone encourage one's own children to read about them.
Which probably has something to do with the popularity of them in countries where "normal" children (the well-off ones, anyway) *are* by default assumed to attend them. Boarding schools "build character" acto the sales pitch. And that has probably *always* been a major part of their sales pitch. Consequently, parents of children who could not afford to send their children away to boarding schools made do by giving them school stories, in hope that they could build some of that character at one remove. For the kids, it's more like reading about fantasy princesses.
ETA: I never get the feeling from any of the HP books that Rowling was the kind of child who enjoyed *learning* anything. The only skill Harry seems to get any feeling of exhileration from having mastered appears to be flying. And that one precicely because he didn't *have* to "learn" it. He could already just *do* it.
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-23 06:45 pm (UTC)Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-24 03:09 am (UTC)Then, in the 1950s, again not completely sure, could have been the early 1960s, there was the TV show McKeever and the Colonel about a trouble-maker boy in a boys' military boarding school. Someone once said it was like the Bowery Boys with uniforms. Definitely a school story, though, with a touch of Sgt. Bilko and maybe McHale's Navy.
Not a whole lot of boarding school stuff. The only other thing I saw about a boarding school was a Christian British import about twins called Lois and Lettuce. My big curiosity was all the references to field hockey, something I'd never heard of.
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-24 04:14 am (UTC)For that matter, I don't know how popular boarding school stories are in Britain among the segment of the population that actually attends them.
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-24 01:55 pm (UTC)Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-24 05:34 pm (UTC)There certainly are such schools. Mostly (although probably not all) are on the east coast, and many of them are church-run. Those famous "prep" schools certainly qualify as well. Those aren't colleges. They're High Schools, which "prepare" kids for college. ("Good" colleges, that is. Ivy league, seven sisters, big name universities.) Hence "Prep". I doubt that many of those are day schools.
But it is taken as a given that only a very small segment of the American population is ever going to get near one of those places. So there doesn't seem to be the glamour to them in the eye of the people who haven't a hope. Maybe it just never got a chance to develop the tradition of desirability such as Eton et als.
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-25 03:45 pm (UTC)Maybe the U.S. boarding school experience was tainted by the Indian Schools of the 1800s. Or maybe it's just a fundamental difference in outlook. My kids don't even want to consider uniforms at a day school let alone a boarding school!
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-25 05:41 pm (UTC)Or, in other words, right at a point that a whole new demographic of "new money" was being formed who could now *afford* to send their sons to boarding school. And "minor" new public schools were popping up like mushrooms all over the country. The stories were *advertising*. "Send your boy to school! He will build character and learn to solve his own problems, and make friends who will be of use to him all his life!" Tom Brown's experiences at Rugby (or wherever it was) was the shining promise to thousands of parents whose sons would have never been accepted there.
We got our own version after WWII when the standard of living rose to the point that the upper end of the working classes could begin to dream of sending their kids to college. All of a sudden all of the old Normal schools and various other make-do training acadamies were suddenly "colleges" and the states started supporting a string of low-cost (at least in those days) colleges so they could do it. But by that time radio and television were the prefered carriers of advertising, and no one felt the need to write formula fiction about it.
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-25 09:06 pm (UTC)Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-26 01:35 am (UTC)I think its more like army comedies like Sgt Bilko and what all were popular, and that network wanted one too. Only they needed a gimick so it wouldn't look too much like anyone else's, and they decided to be different by having it about kids in a military academy rather than soldiers in a war.
I'm at a disadvantage in that I never saw the show. I remember the name, but am blanking on the date and context. Was it early in the general era where one got around the officers, but there was still a real enemy (not a comic one) out there, or was it late, when the military itself was what was being subverted?
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-26 07:54 pm (UTC)1962-1963 season. imdb.com/title/tt0055690/ And, reading the cast list, I'd forgotten young McKeever's father was career military so the kid had that to live up to.
I think the show would fit in either the "school story with spit shine" or "McHale Shrank Sgt. Bilko and Stuck Him With The Kids".
Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-26 09:01 pm (UTC)Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-24 05:43 pm (UTC)Re: subverting the genre part 2
Date: 2009-05-23 09:03 pm (UTC)I think it was in an interview on the ‘Richard and Judy’ Show and is on You Tube if you want to have a look.