Killing Harry - Snape & the DEs - Mundungus - Ghosts - Shipping - Magical College -Werewolf Bites - More

[Catlady]

No: HPFGUIDX 15721

I was in class all week, which was fun but hard, so I had no time to
check e-mail, so I had 500+ posts from just this list (and I'm on other
lists as well) to catch up on. Now I'm caught up, but it is 3:19am --
even without DST it would be 2:19am -- so i am probably irrational and
cranky, and probably going to be late for this afternoon's chat, so I
hope someone else will be recording at least the beginning.

Margaret Dean wrote on Tuesday:
> Doreen wrote:
> > She's bothered by the fact that no one seems to concerned
> >  about whether Hermione will die or not.  Everyone just assumes
> > she'll be fine.
> At the risk of starting up the gender-equality discussion all
> over again, I suspect this is because  Hermione is female.

Naw, it's because Hermione is JKR's self-insertion, and only very warped
people kill their self-insertions.

Amanda wrote on Tuesday:
> Lee Hillman wrote
> > I feel it's entirely likely that Snape will face a great deal of
pain
> > and tribulation getting back into the DE's good graces,
> It's not their good graces he has to worry about. It's Voldemort's.

In my opinion, V's good graces won't protect Snape against DEs who want
vengeance on S for him having gotten them or their loved ones into
Azkaban or for something else, unless Snape gets So Far into V's good
graces that V specifically orders the DEs not to damage Snape, or shows
so much affection to S that the DEs get the idea that V might want to
avenge the death of S. I mean, I feel sure that a lot of DEs kill or
torture other DEs for personal motives such as vengeance, romantic
rivalry, profit...

The DEs will want vengeance on S for putting them in Azkaban only if
they know it was him. I think in real life, they must know, since we saw
in the Pensieve, in the Karkaroff hearing, that Dumbledore stated in
open court that Snape had turned against the Dark Lord while he was
still in power and had been a useful spy for Our Side. Probably Rita
Skeeter wasn't the only journalist covering the trials, and even if some
information were withheld from the newspapers because of 'national
security', it would still spread by word of mouth.

tobeybickle wrote on Wednesday:
> I came here to discuss things like Ashwinders and Centaurs
> and Mundungus Fletcher,

I suppose Ashwinders are the reason why a fire that seems to be out can
burn down a house or a forest (except doesn't JKR say that Ashwinders
only come from magical fires?).

Mundungus Fletcher is named by Dumbledore at end of GoF as a member of
the old gang whom Sirius is to fetch, but near the beginning (ha!) of
GoF, after the riot at the World Cup, Percy tells us that Mundungus
Fletcher put in a claim for losing a twelve-room tent with built-in
Jacuzzi, when he was really sleeping under a cloak propped up on sticks.
We heard the name before in CoS, when Mr. Weasley comes homes from work
and says: "What a night! Nine raids. Nine! And old Mundungus Fletcher
tried to put a hex on me when I had my back turned ......" That all
makes him sound like not an entirely helpful member of the anti-Voldie
team. I looked up 'mundungus' and the dictionary said it means
low-quality, very bad smelling pipe tobacco. Fletcher is an arrow-maker.
I can't imagine what those names could be a clue about.

What about Centaurs?

april gc wrote on wednesday:
> In chapter 13 of PS/SS  (p220 US), one of the things they do
> in DADA is study the "different ways of treating werewolf bites".
> I tend to agree that you have to be treated right after the bite,
> but that you can be cured (otherwise it would be no different
> than treating any dog bite, I would think, and not a subject for
DADA).

I think that werewolf bites differ from dog bites not only in that they
pass on lycanthropy, but that contain werewolf spit, which could well
have magical harmful property, such as reducing healing, weakening the
immune system, or making the person go mad. Such that people are less
likely to heal and more likely to die from a werewolf bite than from a
normal wolf back. So what they learn in DADA could just be to save the
victim's life by magically removing the effects of werewolf spit, altho'
some victims would surely prefer to have been allowed to die rather than
be forced to live as werewolves. This was depicted in the fanfic Call of
the Wild, btw.

I was saddened that FB's section on werewolves says nothing about
whether lycanthropy is contagious when the werewolf is in human form. If
a human who happens to be a werewolf bites you, do you become a
werewolf? How about if he just slobbers on you?

Joywitch wrote on Friday:
> Forgive me if this has been discussed and I somehow missed it, but
> why is Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them on Harry's booklist
> for his first year?  Isn't it the textbook for Care of Magical
> Creatures, which Harry doesn't start until his third year?

Maybe FB was supposed to be part of his first-year DADA class. After
all, it includes Pixies, Grindylows, Redcaps, Kappas -- the first of
which was in Lockhart's DADA course and the rest were in Lupin's, but
perhaps they were supposed to be briefly introduced during first year
and covered in more detail second year and kids should have been on to a
new area by third year.

Mecki asked on Wednesday:
> Why do some people change into ghosts when they die and
> others don't? We know Myrtle and Nick died by force, but
> Prof.Binns just fell asleep in his Armchair.

As someone has already mentioned, in an on-line chat, someone asked JKR
why some people become ghosts, and JKR's answer was something like:
"I'll give you a hint. The ghosts are not the happiest people."

> Myrtle and Binns died in Hogwarts, but I don't think
> Nick was executed there, so why has he, and some of the other
> House-Ghosts come to Hogwarts after their death?

We know that Dumbledore invited two homeless House Elves to live (and
work) at Hogwarts, and perhaps employing Filch the Squib was an act of
charity to someone otherwise unemployable (because of bigotry) in the
wizarding world. Maybe Dumbledore was far from the first Headmaster to
provide Hogwarts as a shelter for homeless magical beings.... I have
thought that ghosts might come from all over the UK to 'live' at
Hogwarts when they have been evicted from their previous homes, and
perhaps a number of the living paintings were given to Hogwarts by
wizarding families who could  no longer stand that nagging Violet or mad
Sir Cadogan.

Crystal wrote on Friday:
> Peeves is a bit different because he's a poltergeist.  Anyone know
> the theoretical difference?

In SS/PS, when the ghosts glide through the Great Hall while Harry is
waiting to be Sorted, the Fat Friar is saying Let's give Peeves a second
chance, and Nearly Headless Nick replies: " He gives us all a bad name
and you know, he's not really even a ghost -"

Jim Ferer wrote on Wednesday:
> It all depends on what kind of woman you think is right for Harry.

Why does it have to be a woman?
I seriously believe that Harry, whose Dursley upbringing left him
tamping down his emotions and avoiding getting close to people, does not
yet HAVE a sexual orientation, and when eventually he does, it might not
be women that he fancies.

Personally, I like Harry/Ron rather than Harry/Draco (except maybe H/D
as a fling). Someone in this conversation mentioned Harry/Cedric, which
had previously never struck me as anything but a joke (one person says
Harry can't be gay because he's never noticed if a male looks good, and
the other replies with quotations showing that Harry noticed that Cedric
was handsome. Ha Ha).

little Alex wrote on Wednesday:
> Oh, the problems with being a slasher...  The first time I've read
> this, I thought it was Hermione/Ginny!

I like Hermione/Ginny. I liked Hermione/Viktor (except that, having
shown that he is a good guy despite his name, JKR will surely kill him
off in the next book, which kind of rules him out) until I read Andrea
from Brazil's fic...

Heidi wrote on Wednesday:
>  (She's obviously with Draco :)
> Ok, those of you who haven't read Surfeit of Kisses won't get it,
> and  if you're R/H, you probably are avoiding it and me like the
> "toadstools" we are

How could they mean 'toadstool' in a nice way? Surfeit of KISSES? Is
that a comment on shipping debates?

Amy Z wrote on (finally!) Thursday:
>  Ron seems to [know about Harry's crush on Cho], though there's
> no mention of Harry telling anyone at all.

At the Welcoming Feast for the other schools, Ron sees Fleur and says
enthusiastically "they don't make them like that at Hogwarts". Harry
automatically looks at Cho while replying "they make them just fine at
Hogwarts". Ron must be pretty dim if he didn't get the message.

little Alex wrote on Wednesday:
> Also, anyone know if there are *any* magical colleges?

As people have said already, JKR has said repeatedly that there is no
university for wizards. I am not the only person who finds it difficult
to believe that such traditionally scholarly and learned folk as wizards
don't have any higher education, and I have formed a theory that there
actually are scholarly guilds (collegium is just the Latin word for
'guild'), research institutes, and at least one Museum.

The scholarly guilds would teach scholars in an apprenticeship system
and award the Degrees of journeyman (Bachelor of Sorcery), master
(Master of Sorcery), and doctor (Th.D, th for 'thaumaturgy'), and they
would have libraries and lecture halls for the use of their members.
Earning the Th.D. must require having one's dissertation accepted by a
committee of senior doctors of the guild, and surviving a public
dissertation defense that lasts -- probably 24 hours. Any people could
come and watch for a while and line up to ask difficult questions and
heckle or cheer.....

The research institutes and the Museum(s) would provide grants (that
cover basic living expenses as well as research expenses) and labs or
offices for researchers as well as libraries and artifact collections. I
imagine there are also guilds and apprenticeship systems for more
practical professions, such as Healers like Madam Pomfrey.

Ed gerstin wrote on Wednesday:
> I hope this hasn't been addressed before: Does anyone have
> a theory about how Voldemort got his wand back at the end
> of GoF? OK, yes, he received it from Wormtail, but how did
> Wormtail get a hold of it?

It has been discussed before. I like the theory that Peter guided V to
the Potter house in person, so he was there when V was knocked down.
Being there in person, it could have been panicky instinct rather than
presence of mind that led him to pick up V's wand and take it with him
as he fled. Soon, he had enough presence of mind to decided either in
advance or very quickly what to do when Sirius caught up with him. I
imagine that he had both his own wand and V's wand with him all those
years as a rat. Someone has pointed out that the animagi don't lose
their clothes when they transform into animals and back again. I think
they keep their clothes, jewelry, wands, eyeglasses, wristwatches, and
all the normal stuff in pockets with them in magical form while they are
animals and it turns back when they do.  I have asserted that this is
one reason it is better to be an animagus than a werewolf, because all
that will transform with a werewolf is clothes, eyeglasses, and wedding
rings. Everything else falls off and gets lost or damaged.

Chained by Freedom wrote (still on Wednesday):
>  Harry grew up in a wealthy household, yet had very little in
> the way of materialistic objects. Therefor, he puts very little
> value on such things, and is generous with the small fortune
> his parents left him.

1. NOT 'therefore'. DESPITE or NONETHELESS
2. Wealthy? The Dursleys? In their little house and owning only one car?
I think they are very middle-middle.
3. Small fortune? Maybe it is a large fortune -- JKR said in a chat that
James had inherited enough money that he and Lily didn't need to work
for a living. They worked for a good cause instead.

tobeybickle wrote on Friday(!):
> And no amount of spiritual conviction on your part allows
> you to dictate morality for others.

I agree with everything you wrote in that post, but feel compelled to
play Devil's Advocate (Lee says it's because I have Jupiter in Libra):
Dictating morality for others is EXACTLY what we do when we post
security guards to prevent differently-ethical individuals from shooting
us with guns or clubbing us over the head in order to rob from our dead
bodies.

Rebecca wrote on Friday:
> An interesting question though is what happens if a muggle
> family with attitudes like the Dursley's produces offspring
> with magical powers

I suppose that Dursleys whose offspring was magic would make life
difficult for that offspring. Rather than adoring himer and spoiling
himer rotten like Dudley, they would scold and spank him for acting
weird. Heesh might be as eager to escape the Dursley house as Harry was.
Perhaps the wizarding world has some legal mechanism to declare parents
unfit and abusive and free the child to be placed with a foster home.
The unfit and abusive  Muggle parents could be provided with a false
memory of their child dying or being institutionalized.

Now it is 5:14am. As soon as the spellchecker finishes, I'm going to
bed. I  hope someone else is recording the chat.
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