CHAPTER DISCUSSION: Chapter 23: Christmas On The Closed Ward

[boyd_smythe]

No: HPFGUIDX 107250

> ariston finally decides to plunk down two knuts:
> <snip>
> 
> I guess I'm kind of raining on the parade here, but I actually don't 
> think this takes away from Alice's gifts to Neville being deeply 
> touching.  In the limited way that she's still capable of, Alice is 
> expressing love.  But when I pause to think just *how* limited that 
> is -- that Alice has been reduced to THIS -- that there might not be 
> any significance to the gum wrappers at all, that perhaps for all 
> Alice knows she's giving Neville pocket fluff or something deadly or 
> a million galleons -- then I feel the pathos of the situation, and 
> the utter horror of what the DEs did to her and Frank, much more 
> strongly.  Azkaban was better, really, than those four DEs deserved.
> -ariston

boyd:

Well said! Many point out that the mere fact that JKR spends so much 
time on this scene indicates that there is something more significant 
going on, e.g. gum wrappers=message to Neville. But isn't it just as 
likely that this is one of the few times that JKR actually shows us 
the horrors visited on the WW during LV's first reign of terror?

Have we seen many killings? No, and perhaps because this is a book 
that will be read by children. But JKR has to make clear just *why* 
LV's way is bad in very personal terms for her audience. This hospital 
scene is a very powerful example of exactly that. We feel Neville's 
anguish, see what two aurors are reduced to, and begin to realize the 
very human cost of a tyrant like Voldemort.

--boyd
Nymphadora Tonks = Had T. Prank My Son. Of course! Tonks is secretly 
Neville's mother and she's hiding it with a Trevor-induced 
memory-charm! Hmmm, a new incredibly unlikely plotline to follow.... 
;)