Picking a Valentine nit

[Amy Z]

No: HPFGUIDX 15338

Kimberly wrote:

> But if kids all over school were getting silly valentines like the 
> one he got all day long, I'd think he'd just shrug and get it over 
> with instead of trying to run away and making things worse.  It'd 
be 
> annoying, but not so horrible that he would need to flee.  The fact 
> that it's unique to him is sort of key, in my mind.

It's unique even if other people have been getting them, because this 
one is tailored to him.  Harry really doesn't like being the center 
of attention, especially with "the hero who conquered the Dark Lord" 
stuff, and I can't think of a 12-year-old I've met who could stand 
anyone praising his toad-green eyes publicly.  I don't think you can 
really compare it to the Fred and George "seriously evil wizard" 
thing (I love that.  How can I have forgotten how hilarious CoS is?  
That scene, the thuggish dwarf, pixies, Kwikspell . . .) because the 
circumstances were so awful that Harry was grateful that there was 
someone willing to say it was ludicrous for him to be the Heir of 
Slytherin.  Doesn't the text even phrase it in such a way to suggest 
that Harry would normally find this kind of behavior embarrassing, 
except for the circumstances?

I agree that probably very few people actually sent these things, 
especially with the specially-authored doggerel.  But I think Harry 
would've been embarrassed anyway, even if he'd seen lots of people 
get them.

> Surely if it 
> was Lockhart's little game only, other students would have had 
> similar experiences all day long, and Harry'd have seen it happen 
and 
> been less freaked out when it happened to him.  I think Lockart set 
> it up for the students to send them, 

For Draco's tease to be effective, it has to have been *possible* for 
Ginny to have sent it--i.e. the whole valentine thing can't be a 
Lockhart-only creation.  But Ginny doesn't have to have sent that 
actual one.  She'd still be humiliated by Draco's comment.

Amy Z
who still likes the idea that Draco sent it himself