Laughing Sirius/Peter's wand/Humor/More Snape/Chinese

[judyserenity]

No: HPFGUIDX 34375

1) Laughing Sirius
SpyGameFan asked:
> > I never was quite sure -- maybe I missed the explanation in the
> > book -- why Sirius was laughing hysterically after Peter blew up
> > the street full of Muggles and turned into a rat. Anyone know? <

I think the key word here is "hystericallly."  I don't think Sirius' 
reaction was a rational one; I think it was an emotional reaction to 
an unbearable situation.  His best friend is dead, and Sirius knows 
that everyone in the wizarding world is going to believe he's 
responsible, and that they'll think he murdered 13 others, and no one 
will ever believe what really happened.  His world has effectively 
come to an end, all because he thought Peter could help protect the 
Potters.  So, he laughs at the irony of it all.



2) Peter's wand
Lord Cassie asked:
> What happened to Pettigrew's wand after he transformed? ....<

I know we've discussed this before, but I think we didn't come to any 
conclusions.  It's also a mystery how Voldy still has his wand, after 
years in disembodied form.  


3) Humor
Several people mentioned the "Slapstick humor" in the Potter books, 
such as Draco the Bouncing Ferret, Pig-tailed Dudley, various hexes, 
etc.  I have to confess that I never even thought those scenes were 
intended to be funny -- I just thought the characters were shown as 
being violent to each other, which I found somewhat distressing. 

I do find the books quite funny, but it's mostly the things various 
people *say*.  I love it when Harry claims, in PoA, that Ron gave him 
the bag of Zonko's tricks after the last Hogsmeade trip, and Snape 
replies without missing a beat "And you've been carrying them around 
ever since?  How very touching."  My favorite dialogue of all, though, 
is a different scene in PoA, where Hagrid is worried about Buckbeak, 
and Ron is trying to distract him.  Ron says:
"Er.. how are the flobberworms?"
"Dead," said Hagrid gloomily. "Too much lettuce."
I love animals, and I think Hagrid's great, but the flobberworms are 
just so ludicrous.  And it's so unexpected when Ron's attempt at 
distracting Hagrid backfires.

4) More Snape (one can never have too much Snape!)
Cindy mentioned that Sirius has a good reason (Azkaban) to be 
emotionally "stuck in time," and I agree, although I still don't like 
him.  (Sorry, Cindy! I can't like Sirius *and* Snape, it's sort of 
like matter and anti-matter.)  Cindy also said that Snape doesn't have 
an excuse for being similary immature.  Donna said that staying at 
Hogwarts may have stunted Snape's growth, and kept him perpetually 
tied to his school years.  Excellant theory!  However, that's not 
really a good excuse for Snape to be immature.  I love making excuses 
for Snape (sort of a cottage industry of mine; too bad it doesn't pay 
well) and I just want to say that we still don't know Snape's whole 
backstory.  Plus, most of his friends were killed or are in Azkaban, 
which presumably was traumatic.  So, maybe he has a good reason for 
failing to mature.  

Finwitch defended Sirius' hostility to Snape at the end of GoF, 
saying:
> Snape smells bad (terrible offence to a dog's nose), was badly in
> the way when he was making friends with Harry, seems to be a Death 
> Eater with that mark, treats Harry badly by insulting the orphan 
> boy's dead father... < 

Slander!  Slander!  (Or would that be libel?  This is a written 
format, but sort of quasi-conversational.  Well, whatever.)  Snape may 
use too much "greasy kid's stuff" on his hair, but there's nothing in 
cannon to say that he smells bad.  Besides, we all know dogs *love* 
bad-smelling stuff.  ("Oooo, garbage!  Should I eat it now, or roll in 
it first?")  Anyway, I don't remember Snape insulting James in GoF.  I 
think Snape and Sirius glare at each other in GoF because, well, 
they're Snape and Sirius.  They've hated each other forever; no 
explanation required. 

5) Chinese
Tabouli gave us a lot of information on the possible origins of Cho 
Chang's name.  One thing she said was:

> in the old Wade-Giles system, I think "Cho" would be "Chou"....
> My feeling is that "Cho" is a non-systematic romanisation from a
> Chinese dialect other than Mandarin.

Actually, I hadn't even been thinking about the name "Cho".  I was 
just thinking about the surname "Chang."  I know that Chang is a very 
popular surname romanisation under the old Wades-Gile system, but not 
under the newer pinyin system, and that it can be found in many places 
in China.  So, I figured the name Chang told us something about *when* 
Cho's family left China, but not *where* in China they came from. 

I guess I just figured that the romanisation of Cho didn't mean much, 
because Cho's family might have been in England a long time when they 
named her, and wouldn't necessarily use any particular system.  But, 
Tabouli gives a lot of interesting information on what her name might 
say about her origins.  Unfortunately, we don't know whether JKR knows 
much about Chinese names.  Maybe Cho Chang's name tells us something 
about her origins, or maybe it just tells us that JKR needs you as her 
expert, Tabouli, in designing Chinese names! 

-- Judy