Green eyes, grandparents, and the Mirror of Erised (Was:Some Discrepancies)

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 86410

Carol wrote:
> > JKR has promised to show the significance of green eyes in future
> > books. She has also promised to tell us what happened to Harry's
> > grandparents. Just as the handsome, smiling young man in the
> > photograph of Harry's parents' wedding comes back into the story 
> in a
> > surprising way, I think those green-eyed relatives and the
> > knobby-kneed old man (clearly a Potter ;-) ) will turn out to be
> > significant.
> > 
> 
greatlit2003 asked:
> Do you know in which interview she mentioned the green eyes and the 
> grandparents? I couldn't find it. Thank you!
> 
> 

Carol responds:
I found the reference to eyes using "mother's eyes," not "green eyes."
It's at

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/quickquotes/articles/1999/1099-bostonglobe-loer.html

Q: Do you know what Harry's parents look like?
JKR: Yes. I've even drawn a picture of how they look. Harry has his
father and mother's good looks. But *he has his mother's eyes and
that's very important in a future book*. (My asterisks to indicate
italics.)

The grandparents reference turns out to relate to James rather than
Lily, a bit odd given the predominance of green-eyed relatives in the
mirror scene:

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/quickquotes/articles/2001/0301-comicrelief-staff.htm

Q: Do we find out more about James Potter's family history in the next
books?
JKR: Yes, you do. 

I also found several passages which indicate that she intended the
mirror of Erised scene quite seriously:

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/quickquotes/articles/1997/0697-sundaytimes-gibb.html

Rowling wrote a chapter in which Harry Potter sees his parents in a
magic mirror after their death. "People have said it is quite a dark
chapter, and I don't think it would have been there if I hadn't lost
my mother while I was writing the book," says Rowling. "I would give
almost anything for another five minutes with my mother which, of
course, would never be enough."

And again:

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/quickquotes/articles/1998/0798-telegraph-bertodano.html

In one chapter Harry looks into a magic mirror which allows the viewer
to see what their heart most desires, and finds his dead parents
waving at him. "He had a powerful kind of ache inside him, half joy,
half terrible sadness," writes Rowling. "I was conscious that when I
looked in the mirror, I would see exactly what Harry saw. But it was
only when I'd written it that I fully realised where it had all come
from."

I don't think JKR would have thrown in a red herring involving
imaginary relatives in a scene that meant so much to her.

To go off-thread a bit, while I was searching for the grandparents
passage I found something which pretty much establishes that Lily
really is a Muggle-born and Petunia is just a Muggle:

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/quickquotes/articles/2000/0200-scholastic-chat.htm

Q: Since Harry Potter's parents were sorcerers and Petunia was Harry's
mother's sister. Shouldn't Petunia be a witch or wizard?
JKR: No. As Hagrid explains in Book I, sometimes a witch or a wizard
occurs in an otherwise Muggle family, just as a Squib is a non-magic
person who occurs in an otherwise magic family. 

So Petunia can't be a squib because she isn't born into a "magic
family." (How that relates to green eyes and grandparents, I can't say!)

Carol, who has spent way too much time researching this post and hopes
it's helpful!