Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 104493

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Debra" <hpsupergeek at y...> wrote:
> > GEO: No that was suppose to be the original title for CoS.
> 
> Yes, but we had already been told that. And she's using a chapter she 
> has attempted to use before; I forget whether or not she tried to use 
> it in CS. But if this is the legitimate title of book six, and it 
> also was a tried-and-failed title of CS, which deals predominantly 
> with Tom Riddle, then it follows semi-logically that the half-blood 
> prince that may or may not make an appearance in book six is Tom 
> Riddle, the younger version of the "King", Lord Voldemort.
(Actually, are sons of lords also known as princes? That might point
us in a 
> different direction.)
> 
> But how would Tom Riddle make another appearance? Perhaps in his 
> schoolboy days he created another preservation of himself, besides 
> the diary, that can be fetched from the Malfoy manor's ... secret 
> hiding place that I forget where it is located? Or perhaps we're 
> still on the wrong track. Or perhaps this isn't the title at all. But 
> it'd be great if you could all just bear with me for a second and 
> pretend it is so we can do what Potter fans do best, and theorize. :)
> 
> ~Debra

Since she says that the half-blood prince isn't Voldemort (who isn't a
real lord, anyway), it probably follows that he isn't young Tom
Riddle, either. (In any case, Diary!Tom is destroyed and it would be
both difficult and anticlimactic to bring young Tom back now.)

I've suggested elsewhere that the HBP could be Dumbledore, who as we
know played an important role in CoS *and* has a soft spot for
Muggles, but then Aberforth would have to be a half-blood prince, too,
and things would get rather messy. Another possibility, brought up by
someone on the OT or movie list (I forget which) is that the HBP could
be Godric Gryffindor--from an era when princes were rather more common
than they are today. We haven't seen any royalty among the modern
wizards, only the self-appointed aristocracy of the purebloods and
their self-named "lord."

The sons of lords are definitely not called princes, though the term
"prince of the blood" was sometimes applied to dukes and earls who
could claim direct (legitimate) descent in the male line from an
English king (e.g. Edward III, ancestor of both the Yorkists and the
Lancastrians). I don't at the moment see how any of this fits the WW
as JKR has presented it to us, but again, it could relate to Godric
Gryffindor. It would make sense for GG to be a half-blood, which would
explain his split with Salazar Slytherin and his refusal to go along
with admitting only pureblood students to Hogwarts.

That's all I can come up with at the moment.

Carol, who is almost as "Siriusly" behind on posting as SSS but is
making a valiant effort to catch up

P.S. I highly recommend reading the Daily Prophet article on JKR's
website to anyone who hasn't done so already. You might also want to
check out the Rumours section to see her reaction to the Storge hoax.
(Sorry I can't do the accent mark on this computer.) C.