Slambooks at Hogwarts

[Rita Winston]

No: HPFGUIDX 806

--- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, Melanie Moore <ravenclawlady at y...> 
wrote:

> I can't see Hogwarts sponsoring slam books (any more than muggle
> junior highs, middle schools, or the equivalent).  I can,
> however, easily picture someone starting one "unofficially," and
> the fad catching on. 

I remember neither the term 'slam book' nor the phenomenon described, 
but I can easily imagine that any clique at my high school who knew 
how to read and write might have joined together to produce one copy 
of what they would probably have called a 'parody yearbook' with such 
categories as 'Ugliest' and 'Most Likely to Serve Time in Prison'. At 
Hogwarts, it sounds tremendously like something Draco would start 
with the intention of concentrating the insults on Harry. 

> I'm trying to picture what magical properties it might have.  A
> Truth Pen (forget the tact!) for example.

A Truth Quill might well *ruin* such a project! For example, the 
boy (an alleged friend of mine!) who learned the word 'epitome' in 
English class and promptly invented the sentence 'Rita Winston is the 
epitome of unfemininity' -- while I have the messy hair, loud voice, 
and extreme lack of interest in fashion that once led a certain 
transvestite to tell me that I, unlike him, was not a real girl, I 
lack *some* of the features of unfemininity, such as football. So the 
Truth Quill would not have allowed him to put that sentence in the 
book.