[HPforGrownups] Owls, Teachers, Death and Housism

Thu Jun 28 09:25:17 UTC 2001

No: HPFGUIDX 21568

 --- Tabouli <tabouli at unite.com.au> ha scritto: 
Tabouli wrote:

<clip>
I'm with Ginny on Ron's inglorious shortening of
Pigwidgeon's name... why shorten a name that
whimsical? I always saw him as a young,
high-spirited miniature adult rather than a baby
owl. Aren't Scops owls a tiny species when
adult? As for the good ship P/H, Hedwig's made
it clear that she thinks Pigwidgeon rather juvenile
and undignified, so I doubt she'd be snatching him
from the cradle/nest

Yep, I'm with you on that one! Remember when in SS/PS
harry first sees the owl shop? It is clear there that
they are all trained post owls and therefore grown up,
but they range from very small to huge barn owls. 

<clip>
>From my memories of my long trek through the HP4GU
holiday mail backlog, I seem to remember this thread
implying that Snape would have made more money by
being a potion peddler or something.

That was me, actually. But I didn't mean he should
have done it for the money and the prestige, I was
just wondering WHY on earth a person that loathed
children, their ways of thinking an behaving so much,
would become a teacher and not earn his living in a
may more fitting his character?

My impression has always been that to be a teacher in
Hogwarts is a very prestigious and probably well-paid
profession in the magic world, in contrast to the
Anglophone muggle world, where they mostly seem to
have low status and salaries. Remember that
Dumbledore is considered the greatest wizard alive,
and he prefers being headmaster at Hogwarts to being
Minister of Magic. Certainly Hagrid is
overwhelmed at the prospect of being a teacher there
and considers Hogwarts teachers to be eminently worthy
of respect. I haven't heard any snooting about
teaching being a lowly profession from the
status-conscious Malfoys, either.

Susanna:<BR>
> I imagine that Hagrid was expelled and,
considering what he <BR>
was accused of, he wasn't allowed to enter the school
grounds for <BR>
quite a long time. Later, when dumbledore became
Headmaster and Ogg <BR>
retired, he called Hagrid.<BR>
<BR>
Exactly. Surely no-one would make Hagrid
gamekeeper at the age of 13, no matter how big and
beast-oriented he was.<BR>

Me again, oh God! But we *are* right, when re-reading
CoS I found that Dumbledore (still as TF teacher)
persuaded the Headmaster to keep hagrid and *train*
him as a gamekeeper. Which, to my enormous relief,
makes Molly weasley younger that 63 :)

Susanna:<BR>
> Where are the other Potters?<BR>
Stephanie:<BR>
> And what happened to those O-so-supportive
Lily/Petunia parents?<BR>
<BR>
I think we're to presume that Voldemort polished off
the lot looking for Harry, hence the great crowd Harry
sees in the Mirror of Erised. Which would give
Petunia still more reasons to be bitter about magic in
general and Harry in particular: her sister's magical
connection caused the death of all her and her
husband's relatives.<BR>

Possible, but do you really think nobody would have
told Harry about this? And, yet another thought,
inspired by your mention of the mirror of Erised:
Those people Harry saw must have been Potters, not
Lily's family, who are Muggles and probably (???)
wouldn't move on a wizard foto. So, where are Lily's
Muggle parents, according to Petunia so proud of their
witch daughter? Petunia would certainly have mentioned
in one of her rants if *they* had all been killed!

However*, does anyone else besides me feel faintly
bothered by JKR's shameless partisanship for
Gryffindor? Yes, I know she values bravery more
highly than the virtues embodied in the other houses,
but making all but a couple of the significant
unambiguously "good" characters in the books
Gryffindors strikes me as a touch housist (?).
Are hard workers and those of "ready mind"
really so intrinsically weak at Quidditch that they
accept without question that the Cup is always a fight
between Slytherin and Gryffindor (in which they of
course support Gryffindor, the Good Guys)??
Don't Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff ever win the House
Championship? Why don't Ravenclaws make up for
lost Quidditch points by getting points for
classwork? Hermione aside, you'd expect them to
dominate in the top students of the year. 
 
Speculations welcome...

You said it, your fault! Yes, JKR is in fact taking
the Malfoy point of view about the houses- Hufflepuffs
are useless anyway, just good workers and nothing
else.

LOL susanna/pigwidgeon37

<br>

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