Does the sorting hat sort? and SHIP: Hr, GW, LL

[dan]

No: HPFGUIDX 84767

Hermowninny:

> What if the sorting hat doesn't really sort you by your abilities, 
> but confirms your choice.  After all, the quote from Dumbledore 
about 
> your choices determining who you are more than your abilities comes 
> right after Harry tells Dumbledore that the hat wanted to put him 
in 
> Slytherin.
> 
> In reference to your comments above... Draco's comments about the 
> sorting would make perfect sense if the students didn't know how 
the 
> sorting hat worked.  Perhaps even the teachers don't know.  Perhaps 
> only the four founders know exactly what the sorting hat is 
> programmed to do.

Dan:

The corollary of this is then that the "other" house considered is 
also part of the particular student's "desire," and there's nothing 
that says that other, more hidden desire isn't, or won't be, in fact, 
the stronger one, at some point in the course of school, or even at 
the moment of sorting. There are different ways of dealing with inner 
dualities - and anyway, the house system is a bit of a 
simplification, yunno. Some might be quite accepting of inner 
dualities, or pluralisms, even, others might feel threatened. Of 
course, the idea of being taken over by some secret desire, or 
secretly by some other, is addressed symbolically in the series 
anyway, in every book, at the core of each book, in fact. 
(LV/Quirrell, TR/GW, animaguses and wrongful imprisonment and 
polyjuice and the "double" duo, Moody/Crouch Jr., LV/HP) Some have 
suggested Loony's Lion hat is somehow thematically related to the 
idea of student's moving toward other houses. At Scarhead's revisit, 
the hat confirms it's ideas regarding Scarhead, though, of course, 
Scarhead does eventually pull GG's sword out of it, which is strange, 
even in the witchwizard world. Did Buzzy (my nick for Albus) stow it 
in there, or did Godric (or one of the other founders) hack it up?

As for SHIPPING Scarhead - I agree he's going to die (in some 
fashion) and be tragically alone and all that. No Shire for Scarhead. 
He will get out of the closet, however. Nevertheless, though he loves 
Granger (the Granger inside, the writer JKR?), and though pity for 
the other is hardly the way to begin romance (the pity is moved 
aside, thankfully), I still hold out for a slowly flowering, and 
awfully tragic, relationship with Loony, who I consider to be, in 
fact, the only other RW character in the book, besides Scarhead. 
Scarhead's held a little too precious in some ways, which the affect 
in OOP didn't effect.