Identifying the Put-Outer

[Doriane]

No: HPFGUIDX 86014


> > Oryomai asked:
> > OoP, Chapter Three: page 58 (American):
> > "Got it," he muttered, raising what looked like a silver 
> > cigarette lighter into the air and clicking it.
> > <snip>
> > "Borrowed it from Dumbledore," growled Moody, pocketing the Put-
> > Outer.
> > 
> > My question is this: how did Harry know it was the Put-Outer?

> Carol:
> 
> Second, Moody's cumpulsion to explain to Harry that he borrowed the
> Put-Outer from Dumbledore without telling him what it is seems
> unmotivated. Why do it? The explanation implies that Harry already
> know what the Put-Outer is and that it belongs to Dumbledore--as if
> Moody is forgetting that Harry was fifteen months old when 
> Dumbledore put out the lights on Privet Drive and can't possibly 
> have any recollection of the incident (even if he'd been awake). 

DD used the Put-Outer to turn the lights off way before Harry 
arrived. But Harry might have seen him turning the lights back on 
again. But *Moody*, on the other hand, most definitely wasn't there 
to see DD use the Put-Outer. As fas as we know anyway... (Hint ! 
Hint ! Lol )

> Alternatively, the "borrowed it from Dumbledore" line may just be a
> rather clumsy way of presenting information to the reader without
> having Harry ask Moody what the object is, a tactic that might have
> needlessly slowed the pace of the narrative (and deprived us of a
> chance for overanalysis).

My question then is : why did we need to know that Moody was using 
DD's Put-Outer in the first place ? Moody owns quite a lot of magical 
devices, why not a Put-Outer ? If the narrator had told me nothing 
more, I would simply have assumed that either Moody owned his own PO, 
or DD had lent his to him. So as far as I was concerned, there was no 
need to explain the origin of the PO at all, which makes it all look 
very suspicious now :-)

Del