Muggle Parents of Magical Children

[darrin_burnett]

No: HPFGUIDX 40778

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., Alexander <lav at t...> wrote:
>   Greetings!
> 
> > darrin_burnett wrote:
> 
> d> Ah, but what about Muggle parents who have no desire, for
> d> whatever reason, for their children to be brought up as a
> d> witch or wizard?
> 

Alexander wrote:


>   I think the solution is the scene at the Hut-on-the-Rock,
> where Hagrid says that if Harry wants to go to Hogwarts,
> then no muggle will be able to stop him. Thus, I think it's
> the child who makes the decision to go or not to go (surely
> if child doesn't want to go, nobody will be able to force
> him to).


Hmmm...I would hope the parents get at least SOME say in an 11-year-
old's decision to alter the course of his or her life. :) I agree 
with what has been said though. For Muggle parents, an owl just won't 
do. There needs to be some explanation of what's going on.

But take Hermione's parents. They seem to have accepted all this. It 
seems the one thing they ask of Hermione is that she fix her teeth 
naturally. They are both dentists and perhaps violating the Muggle 
laws of physics in dentistry is just too much for them.

But Hermione eventually gets them fixed magically anyway. Perhaps I 
am missing the cultural difference here -- the boarding school 
mentality where you send your child to a school to live as well as 
learn -- but such behavior leads me to believe that the Grangers have 
essentially lost their daughter to the Wizard world, and she's not 
coming back. 




> 
> d> Say, Dudley started to display Magic ability. Vernon and
> d> Petunia would sooner be turned into ferrets than to have
> d> him go to Hogwarts. I have a hard time believing all
> d> Muggles are overjoyed to find out their children have
> d> this potential.
> 
>   I would be overjoyed. It's just cool! Actually, I would
> soon know Hogwarts schoolbooks better than my child... ;)
> 

Sure, but imagine it happening to some Jerry Falwell-disciple. I 
mean, there are plenty of anti-Harry Potter wackos out there. I 
realize religious fundamentalism is perhaps not the force in the UK 
that it is in the United States, but I would have to believe SOMEONE 
somewhere would be against it.



> d> And we know that Wizard parents have the option of
> d> sending their children to other schools. Lucius nearly
> d> sent Draco to Durmstrang. It is possible some UK Wizards
> d> -- especially Slytherins -- would not want their children
> d> anywhere near Dumbledore.
> 
> d> Are Muggle parents FORCED to send their children to
> d> Hogwarts?
> 
>   That's interesting, but I don't think it's the case. How
> many British children of age 11 do you know who can attend
> Beauxbatons and learn there? That is, who know French well
> enough? And to go to Durmstrang they probably need to know
> some Slavic language (most likely Russian).
> 

The Malfoys would probably pay for a personal translator until Draco 
picked up the language -- if he ever decided to bother, that is. 
Other students would probably have to learn the language. 


>   BTW this leaves me to wonder what school do German
> children attend? There were no Germans among Durmstrang
> students - all were Slavic in origin. So Germans probably
> have a school of their own, just not so big as the other
> three.
> 


Well, just because there weren't any in the book doesn't mean there 
weren't any. I don't remember a roll call of the ethnicities of the 
Durmstrang students. 

But it's an interesting point. The Italians, Scandanavians, Spanish 
and Portuguese, Swiss, Austrians, and Germans seem to be left out 
here. 


>   BTW, about Karkaroff's name: in Russian "kar-kar" is the
> sound emitted by crows and ravens (corresponds to "caw-caw"
> in English). Ending "off" is just standard second name
> ending and conveys no meaning. So Karkaroff is "raven",
> whatever this means...
> 
> d> Darrin
> d> -- If my parents tried to stop me, I'd turn them into
> d> ferrets.
> 
>   My mother would probably disapprove, but my father would
> say "yeah!" (he's a Potterfan as well... ;)
> 
>   But what question bothers me most of all, is just HOW did
> muggle-born wizards learn magic in Russia? Parents have
> choice what school to send their child to, that's no
> trouble, but sometimes they will need a document from the
> school that says that their child is learning there (such
> docs are required to get some other docs, this comes
> especially important when dealing with real estate - Russian
> laws limit real estate operations if there's a child living
> in the place). So there probably must be some "fictional"
> school that works as muggle cover for Durmstrang. And to
> keep this fake school secret, officials' hands must be
> "greased" with money... ya, so Durmstrang actually supports
> the corruption in Russian government!!! ;)
> 

Actually, I envision Durmstrang not so much in Russia as in one of 
the old Eastern European provinces. It's a cliche, but the whole 
effect was very Transylvanian to me. As for the fictional school, 
Hogwarts is bewitched to look like a rundown old building. Why 
couldn't Durmstrang be bewitched to look like a normal school? No 
muss, no fuss. Just tell Comrade Busybody that the kid goes to the 
normal school, when in fact he or she goes to Durmstrang.


>   I also wonder what marks do Durmstrang students get into
> their muggle fake-school certificates? Especially for
> subjects like physics, higher maths, biology etc...
> 
> --
>   My IMHO: Rowling would do a great favour for the world, if
> she would just sit down and re-write the books, eliminating
> all the stupid mistakes, troubles and inconsistencies.
> 


Yeah, and each book would be about 2,000 pages long to explain things 
like whether Polish students get to go to Durmstrang or do they have 
their own school. Don't see it happening. :)

Darrin