Marauders: Board of Coolest Cats in each House or Gryffian mob? -- Rita the beetle

[Martin Smith]

No: HPFGUIDX 25651

I wonder if the Marauders were in fact representatives of the four houses?
It would most certainly help their mischief-making if they had knowledge of all areas of the castle, even every single house's common room, and that would also help them making the MM. Having an ally in each house would make them stronger as a group. Back then, before V's RoT, the social activities of Hogwarts might have been a lot more interhousal than nowadays. So, can we see any evidence and/or hints what house each Marauder would belong to if they weren't all Gryffs (as universally presumed)? Let's see (most of this is my own speculations):

James:
Well, we know from canon that James was in Gryffindor, so there's no doubt there.

Sirius:
Hagrid's statement that every wizard turned bad was Slytherin and the fact that Hagrid, at that time, was convinced that Sirius was one of the worst, only makes sense if Sirius was in Slytherin.
Furthermore, to successfully survive _and_ escape from Azkaban, you certainly need a lot of ambition and desire to really want it. Yes, you could use brains, hard work and bravery to avoid twelve years worth of mindsucking Dems, but what you really need is strong will-power, which, IMO is deeply linked to ambition.
Furtherfurthermore, the feud between Snape and Black could be the result of jealousy on Snape's behalf that Black, not Snape, was chosen as the Slytherin representative in the Marauder Quartet. Hence Sirius Slytherin.

Pettigrew:
I wouldn't call PP brave (hiding behind the biggest bully in the playground as he normally does), neither loyal (switching sides like a tennis-ball in action) nor hard-working (he was described as a below-average student). This would put him on low priority on the Gryff and Huff lists.
He certainly doesn't aim for the number one spot, he merely wants to reach a kind of status quo, so, IMO, his ambition level is too low to satisfy Salazar Slytherin (I, too, love alliteration:-)).
Is he smart? I would have to say, yes, he is. Very much so. His plot to frame Black, team up with Voldie (the present Big Kahuna) and see to it that the Potters were killed, gets the result of him being remembered as a true hero for the Good side (was it Order of Merlin, First Class he recieved postum?). That is ingenious! Selfish, evil and wicked, yes, but still ingenious. So therefore, IMHO, PP was in Ravenclaw (don't get me wrong, you Ravs out there, I have nothing against that house; I'm a Rav myself).

Lupin:
If my analysis is correct, our favourite wolfman was in Hufflepuff. As I see it, he has all it takes to be a Rav (he has shown on DADA lessons and such that he is bright) or a Gryff (needless to say, it takes a lot of bravery to tell your not-yet-extremely-close friends that you're a manmunching manwolf (alliteration again!)). But he also has what it takes to be a Huff: He, like the rest of the wizarding world, thought that Black was a hardened criminal who'd killed his best friends, but he always had a place in his heart where he believed Black to be innocent, and after one word from Sirius in the Shrieking Shack, Lupin took Black back to his heart and redeemed their friendship. That qualifies as loyalty in my book.
Lupin is also, IMO, hard-working. Fighting against werewolf trademarks such as eating your fellow men takes a lot of struggling, with or without wolfsbane potion. Plus, even though he apparently can't keep a job, due to his lycanthropy, he seems to get along financially (just head above water, though). What he does is probably travelling around, looking for hard labour every so often he can get it, and working his three-weeks-a-month-tail-less bodypart off a few days before his employers find out. Then back to job-hunting, and believe you me, it is much more work constantly looking for job, than to have a regular one. I've been there. Hardworking Hufflepuff, him.



In conclusion: I believe it possible that the Marauders were a group of one representative from each house, containing James Potter of Gryffindor, Peter Pettigrew of Ravenclaw, Sirius Black of Slytherin and Remus Lupin of Hufflepuff.

If, however, there is evidence in canon that two or more of the Marauders were in Gryffindor, I will stand corrected. If so, please enlighten me!




As for Rita Skeeter's Animagus form being a beetle and not a mosquito (I tried to post this a few days ago, but it seems to have got lost, so here it is again):

<silly explanation, coming through...>

The most famous Rita is (or at least the first Rita I can come to think of, except our own Catlady, of course) the meter maid in the song "Lovely Rita" by:

The Beatles!

There you go, that must be it! I rest my case. At least until someone finds an almost as obvious as abovementioned connection between Rita Skeeter (gossip reporter and verbal paparazzi) and constant cartoon private Beetle Bailey. (i told you twas silly)



Martin, still awaiting the Simpsons take on HP in next season's Halloween special