Cats-Kneazles-Crookshanks-Arabella Figg

[rja.carnegie at excite.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 19535

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "Scott" <insanus_scottus at y...> wrote:
> Arabella Figg. Who is she and when will we find out about her? I 
> recently finished reading "Jude the Obscure" (yes I was reading it in 
> Feb., but I put it down for a month, or two, or three :-) so...) and 
> while I don't think JKR necessarily took Arabella's name from it, it 
> IS the only other book I've ever read with a character named 
> Arabella. Any speculation? (If this is correct I don't think we 
> should hold out much hope for her character.)
> 
> As far as Crookshanks goes there has been lots of theories as to
> M(r)s. Figg being an animagus etc. But my best bet is that
> 
> A) She's a Kneazle breeder, and that's why there are so many "cats" 
> around.
> or B) The cats are there to detect anything unsavoury that might harm 
> Harry. 
> 
> I know, I know! Both these thoughts have been expressed before, but 
> It seemed like a nice thing to add to the  Arabella thread.

>From a quick Web search, I think the name Arabella is mostly
European.  I don't know if there's a Web site to look up -
wait, let's guess: www.babyname.com.  Bingo!  Obviously I'm
not sure how authoritative this is, but allegedly 'This girl's
name is used in English and Italian.  Its source is orabilis,
a Latin word meaning "Prayerful."'

www.imdb.com says that the actress Arabella Weir was born in
California; I was about to claim her as British?

Figg doesn't appear in my Glasgow phone books as a surname;
Figgins does (three of 'em); there's a film director named
Mike Figgis (I didn't look up www.imdb.com for that.)

The conjunction is unusual, then.  Now, without reading
more than a synopsis, I don't suppose that perhaps Thomas
Hardy's Arabella Figg may _be_ JKR's - the story might have
turned out differently if she'd told Jude that she was a
witch?  Although Hardy was the subject of episcopal book-burning
as it was...

Now - where does Mrs. Norris fit into this?

(When Filch thinks she's dead, he calls it murder...)

Robert Carnegie
Glasgow, Scotland

"I read them all when I was seven and I hated them" - unnamed American
office worker on the Harry Potter books (www.dilbert.com, List of
Stupid Things Overheard)