[HPforGrownups] (was: The Sorting Hat)

[Kathryn Cawte]

No: HPFGUIDX 87353

Iris

Philosopher's Stone (Bloomsbury paperback):
 - Well, that's it then, isn't it? Harry said.
The other two stared at him. He was pale and his eyes were
glittering.
- I'm going out of here tonight and I'm going to try and get to the
Stone first.
- You're mad! said Ron.
- You can't, said Hermione. After what Mc Gonagall and Snape have
said? You'll be expelled!
- SO WHAT? Harry shouted. Don't you understand? If Snape gets hold
of the Stone, Voldemort's coming back! Haven't you heard what it was
like when he was trying to take over? There won't be any Hogwarts to
get expelled from! He'll flatten it, or turn it into a school for
the Dark Arts! Losing points doesn't matter any more, can't you see?
D'you think he'll leave you and your families alone if Gryffindor
win the House Cup? If I get caught before I can get to the Stone,
well, I'll have to go back to the Dursleys and wait for Voldemort to
find me there. It's only dying a bit later than I would have done,
because I'm never going over to the Dark Side! I'm going through the
trapdoor tonight and nothing you two say is going to stop me!
Voldemort killed my parents, remember?.

Maybe my favourite moment in the whole series. Harry's perfectly
conscious of the danger he has to face when he decides to go through
the trapdoor in order to find the Stone.

K

He's not 'perfectly conscious of the danger he ahs to face'. As far as he
and the other two are concerned if he fails, he'll get expelled. That's it.
*none* of them seem to think that going after the Stone could get them
killed, the only mention of danger to life is when Harry's talking about
what'll happen if Voldemort actually gets the stone. Harry has no idea at
all what he's doing and he drags his friends with him (yes I know they chose
to go, but he knows that they won't let him go alone). He's acting exactly
as you'd expect an eleven year old Gryffindor to act. Stupidly, rashly and
with no grasp of the consequences of his actions.

Neville on the other hand it seems to me has a good grasp of the
consequences of standing up to them or he wouldn't say he's willing to fight
them - he knows there's a good chance that they won't back down because he's
there but he tires anyway - against three people who are stronger, brighter
and more magically powerful than he is. Having seen how isolated Hermione
was at the beginning of the year he's probably well aware that he could be
about to alienate three of the most popular kids in his year and house and
leave himself without friends and at worse they could hex him (which they
did). He's the only one who deserved any points at the end of year feast in
my not at all humble opinion. Yes Hermione and Ron especially showed skill,
courage and brains once they were going after the stone but they should
never have been there in the first place.

I wasn't terribly impressed with the Trio at the end of PS at all or the way
Dumbledore was fawning all over them and giving them points. I don't blame
Harry for his actions at the end of Oop - going to the Ministry on a rescue
mission - between the complete failure of people who were supposed to be
wiser than he is to tell him things that he had a right to know (like
*exactly* what Voldemort was doing to him, would it have *killed* someone to
explain that the visions were being sent deliberately to try and trick him
rather than accidentally as a useful source of information?) and the fact
that he has consistently been taught that if you break the rules and anyone
but Minerva or Severus catch you you'll probably get rewarded for it he
really couldn't be expected to act any other way.

Albus maintains he left him with an abusive family so that he wouldn't grow
up with people treating him like he was something special and then has
consistently treated him like that for five years. He comes up with this
absurd idea at the end of OoP that he has kept Harry in the dark to protect
him after consistently failing to take any meaningful actions to do so over
the last four books. Either he's nowhere near as wise and powerful as we've
been told or he's out and out lying for some reason - and I'm beginning to
favour the latter idea. Dumbledore is playing a real-life game of Wizards'
Chess and cares as much for the welfare of his pieces as a child with a toy
chess set - the only trouble being that toy chess pieces repair themselves
after every battle and human beings, even wizards, don't.

K
*grumpy today for some reason and just waiting for someone to say something
unwarranted about the Slytherins so I can let fly*