Zabini and Nott/was The Good, The Bad

justcarol67 justcarol67 at yahoo.com
Wed Feb 25 06:15:51 UTC 2004


No: HPFGUIDX 91603

Koinoinia wrote:
<snip>
 But are the weedy-Nott and the stringy-Slytherin one and the same? 
Not necessarily. 
> 
 ~There were only two other people who seemed to be able to see them: 
 a stringy Slytherin boy...

 Here are two teenagers described as 'stringy'. Both in Slytherin. One 
 is in the same year as Harry. The other, of course, is Snape in his 
 youth. Twice JKR has used the word 'stringy' to describe a teenage 
 boy in one book. Yet we don't know for sure who the stingy-thestral 
 kid is. 
 
 I guess I do find Blaise Zabini more interesting for a couple of 
 reasons, one being the way he was sorted.
 
SORTING
The following are in the same year as Harry:
Millicent Bulstrode, Vincent Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Draco Malfoy, 
Theodore Nott, Pansy Parkinson, and Blaise Zabini.
<snip> 
 ~
And now there were only three people left to be sorted. <snip>
"Well done, Ron, excellent," said Percy Weasley pompously across 
Harry as "Zabini, Blaise," was made a Slytherin.<snip>
 
See, no big event for Blasie. Only for the famous Harry Potter. All 
eyes are on Harry and during this time JKR slips in Blaise. And why 
should we bother to think twice about Blaise? He's just another kid 
being sorted. But this kid is at least named. We know he is there. 
And JKR doesn't just throw in names for nothing. So while the 
reader's attention is on the famous Potter, Blaise just takes his 
> seat with the Slytherins. 
> 
> I just think there's more to Blaise than we know and I do believe 
> it's possible he is the stringy-Slytherin.

Carol:
I agree that JKR doesn't throw in names for nothing. I also admit the
 possibility that Blaise is the "stringy" Slytherin who sees
Thestrals. OTOH, "weedy" suggests much the same thing as "stringy" and
is definitely applied to Theo, so the Thestral boy at least equally
likely to be him. Theo is also named in the sorting ceremony, though
not being at the end of the alphabet (and not having a fancy name), he
doesn't stand out like Blaise. He's thrown in with a cluster of other
students, several of whom we've already met: Moon (who's Moon?), Nott,
Parkinson, Patil and Patil, and Perks, Sally-Anne (SS 121, Scholastic
ed.). Sally-Anne Perks, like Blaise Zabini, has her full name listed,
but we haven't heard a peep from either her or Blaise since the
Sorting ceremony. Theo, on the other hand, is specifically pointed out
by Hermione in OoP--and his father (or grandfather) is one of the
Death Eaters arrested with Malfoy at the MoM. So whether or Nott Theo
is "the good Slytherin" or the boy who saw Thestrals (and I think he's
the latter, at least), I'll bet every knut I earn this year that he'll
be in the next book, quite possibly as a member of the DA. (Since I'm
not paid in knuts, that's a safe bet, right?)

Carol





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