Harry's Temper Was Re: Feelings on OoP

[Donna]

No: HPFGUIDX 80533

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Doriane" <delwynmarch at y...> 
wrote:
 
> That's always been the stickiest part for me, right from PS. Harry 
> *never* asks the most obvious and necessary questions. He *never* 
> asked anyone to tell him about his parents. He still doesn't know 
for 
> sure what they did as a job. He never inquired about his 
grandparents 
> either. He *accidentally* discovered about Sirius, his father's 
very 
> best friend, his parents' best man, during his *third* year at 
> Hogwarts !! Etc, etc, etc...
> 
> I understand JKR had to withhold information from us, but this 
never 
> made any sense to me, so I'm not bothered anymore that he doesn't 
ask 
> the questions that truly bother him in OoP...
> 
> Del

D replies -

Harry grew up knowing only not to ask questions.  (SS US edition pg. 
20 Paperback):

The only thing Harry liked about his own apperance was a very thin 
scar on his forehead that was shaped like a bolt of lightning.  He 
had had it as long as he could remember, and the first question he 
could ever remember asking his Aunt Petunia was how he had gotten it.

"In the car crash when your parents died," she had said.  "And don't 
ask questions."

*Don't ask questions* - that was the first rule for a quiet life with 
the Dursleys.

A leopard cannot change its spots overnight.  So, I find it 
reasonable that Harry doesn't ask the right questions.  He hasn't 
been around the right people to ask about his parents either.  Let's 
face it, Sirius has to be in hiding as the MoM is after him, so that 
doesn't lend itself to long intimate conversations.  Remus leaves 
Hogwarts and is not readily available to Harry.  Dumbledore is fairly 
inaccessable also.  (But personally, I think if Harry wanted to, and 
before OotP, he could sit down with him and ask questions.) Ron would 
only know what he has been told growing up.  Hermione knows only what 
she has gleaned from books about LV.  Molly and Arthur probably knew 
James and Lily, but I do not get the impression they were intmate 
friends.  So, where does that leave Harry to go to find out?

Yet, we see Harry developing over the series.  I think that in the 
last two books we will see Harry asking the "right" questions.  He is 
becoming more mature and independent.  

A side note - as to what DD sees in the mirror - Harry wasn't 
entirely sure DD was telling him the truth, but just enough of the 
truth of what he saw to satisfy Harry at the time.  Yes, he probably 
saw himself with socks.  But I think he saw a grown up, healthy, 
happy Harry giving him those socks.  Don't you think at the time that 
that was the deepest, most despirate desire of DD's heart?

D