Mirrors, Barkeeps, and General Theories

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 73882

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "threadbareowl" 
<threadbareowl at y...> wrote:
> Hi everyone, I'm a long-time HP fan, first time poster. After 
reading 
> OOP a few times, I had these burning questions and/or comments - if 
> they are highly repetitive, forgive me. 
> 
> 1. Sirius gave Harry a mirror to use in case of emergency, and in 
an 
> emergency, Harry doesn't use it! 




Two reasons. First, from OOTP Chapter 24 where Harry and the others 
are leaving to get the Knight Bus:

(Sirius) "I want you to take this, he said quietly, thrusting a badly 
wrapped package ....... into Harry's hands. "What is it?" Harry 
asked. "A way of letting me know .... No, don't open it in 
here...."said Sirius ...... "OK", said Harry, stowing the package 
away ..... but he knew he would never use it .... It would not be he, 
Harry, who lured Sirius from his place of safety.

ie HP didn't want to compromise SB's safety.

Second, from the last chapter:

Harry ..... noticed a badly wrapped package lying in a corner of it 
(his trunk). He could not think what it was doing there ..... He 
realised what it was within seconds. Sirius had given it to him 
inside the front door of number twelve Grimmauld Place.


ie Harry had completely forgotten about it. It had been given at a 
time when everybody was rushing around in ever decreasing circles 
getting ready.



> 4. All evidence points to Aberforth Dumbledore being the barkeep at 
> the Hogshead - so what do you think his role is, why so secretive?
>




Evidence? Other than he seemed vaguely familiar to HP?


 
 
> 
> 6. I'm completely clueless as to what year who went to school, but 
if 
> the CoS hadn't been opened for 50 years in the early 90s, then all 
> the Tom Riddle/Hagrid stuff was pre-1945 - right? My point is that 
> did Voldemort know or idolize Grindelwald before he was defeated by 
> Dumbledore in 1945? 
>


If you assume the COS took place in the year in which it was 
published (1998), that puts the previous events as 1948.....



 
> 7. And finally, this is wild speculation without an ounce of 
> evidence, but I was thinking - could Godric Gryffindor, an 
animagus, 
> BE Fawkes? I mean, why not? *waits for someone to point out 
something 
> obvious that I missed*
> 

Interesting sideline. In one of JKR's interviews she makes a remark 
about drawing links between Gryffindor House and the house where 
James and Lily lived... In the very first chapter of PS, it is 
identified as Godric's Hollow. I have been half expecting HP to be 
revealed as a descendant of GG.....

Food for thought!

Geoff