A midget in glasses, was SHIP Banter and SHIP subjects

[Erica <cymru1ca@yahoo.ca>]

No: HPFGUIDX 50980

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Amy Z <lupinesque at y...>" 
<lupinesque at y...> wrote:
> Erica wrote:
> 
> > mean(3) adj. 
> > 
> > Occupying a middle or intermediate position between two extremes. 
> > Intermediate in size, extent, quality, time, or degree; medium.
> 
> Excellent documentation, Erica!  

Thanks.  Words and wordplay is kind of a hobby of mine, though I'm 
not terribly *good* at it.   Still, I'm chuffed that I can, on 
occassion, *almost* complete the G&M's cryptic crossword ;)


> mean that he, and JKR, thought "mean stature" meant "lack of 
height" 
> in this context.  Which, compared to Ron, Harry certainly has.
> 
>

Yes compared with Ron, Harry has a 'lack of height' but then Ron is a 
lanky kid (I see him towering over the twins) so that most all of his 
classmates when compared with him would have a 'lack of height'.  
Harry is of average stature; not very tall, not very short, not very 
thin, no very fat.  There is, for all appearances, 
nothing 'extraordinary' about him.

 I could almost let that stand in for my favorite line; it's not so 
> much the line itself as Ron's imitation of Trelawney.  However, 
I'll 
> go with another Trelawney-inspired Ron line that always leaves me 
> helpless no matter how many times I read it:
> 
> "And on Wednesday, I think I'll come off worst in a fight."
> "Aaah, I was going to have a fight.  OK, I'll lose a bet."
> "Yeah, you'll be betting I win my fight . . ."

There are many lines in the book that are favourites of mine, some 
humourous, some poignant and others that spark a memory of lines from 
other works.  In GoF, Pansy says of Hermione 'Very pretty? Her?' (or 
something like that) which always brings to mind (for me) that line 
in P and P "She a beauty! -- I should as soon call her mother a 
wit."  but that's just me :D

Erica

Questions and answers between the scholar and the master, of the 
vantages and disadvantages between a tall man, and a man of mean 
stature, having both the perfect knowledge in their weapons.
 
Scholar: Who has the advantage in fight, of a tall man, or a man of 
mean stature? 

Master: The tall man has the vantage, for these causes(23): his reach 
being longer, and weapon unto his stature accordingly, he has thereby 
a shorter course with his feet to win the true place, wherein by the 
swift motion of his hand, he may strike or thrust home, in which time 
a man of mean stature cannot reach him, & by his large pace, in his 
true pace in his regression further, sets himself out of danger, & 
these are the vantages that a tall man has against any man of shorter 
reach than himself. 



>