24 hours - again

[a_reader2003]

No: HPFGUIDX 103152

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "slgazit" <slgazit at s...> wrote:
> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Barry Arrowsmith
> <arrowsmithbt at b...> wrote: 

> Conversely Minerva, on her own initiative, arrives at Privet Drive
> early in the morning and waits for something to happen. Very 
strange.
> It was term-time (Halloween), but she leaves her teaching duties and
> chooses to sit in a cold street for 16 hours or so on the basis of 
what
> she calls rumours, rumours she can only have heard very early that
> morning.

"slgazit"  replied:

I have not read or posted here in a while now, but here is my take.
Hagrid, Diggle, McGonnagal... They were all members of the original
OOP I believe. Likely Dumbledore was not at Hogwarts when the attack
happened but at the headquarters (whereever that may have been) and
notified the members on hand what happened then summoned Hagrid to get
the baby (from whom McGonnagal would get a sketchy report). Diggle
probably was there and that was how the news and fireworks started.


Carolyn:
Well, actually, we don't know that McGonagal *was* in the original 
Order. She was not described by Moody when he shows Harry the photo 
of them all (Ch 9, OoP), and he seems to go through them in a lot of 
detail. She may have taken the photograph, of course, but photography 
hasn't come up as one of her interests yet. Like Arthur and Molly, I 
feel there's some back history still to come out as to the reasons 
for this.

Whilst not necessarily going for ESE!McGonagal on this slender 
supposition, it has been widely noticed before that for some reason 
she is not in DD's inner circle of most-trusted people. The day spent 
on the wall at Privet Drive seems to confirm this. And as soon as she 
is given something responsible to do, she 'slips up' (guarding Barty 
Crouch Jr); maybe she didn't want him questioned about other matters. 
By OoP she's been relegated back to nothing much important, and seems 
desperate to prove that she is loyal. Maybe another teacher with a 
secret in her past that DD is having to work with, just like Snape, 
but not so obvious.

She seems to have taken over the transfiguration teaching job in 
1956, perhaps when DD got promoted to Headmaster, and we don't know 
anything about her past before this. The dates of her arriving at 
Hogwarts preclude her teaching Tom Riddle (he would have been aged 30 
when she started teaching), but she is of a generation to know much 
more about him as a young man than many people. If JKR is to be 
believed that Minerva is 'a sprightly 70', they were actually born 
within a year of each other, and quite likely were at Hogwarts 
together. Maybe she had a crush on him - he was supposed to be good-
looking as a teenage boy. Maybe *her* parents knew Tom Riddle's 
mother..

It is also valid to speculate she may have taken a special interest 
in the transformations he subsequently went through to become Lord 
Voldemort as we see him today - after all, it is her chosen subject, 
and he was one of the school's most brilliant students. It could all 
add up to DD knowing that she has her weak spots, and like not giving 
Snape the DADA position, he doesn't risk her with many pieces of 
information. McGonagall's anxiety on the wall at Privet Drive is 
almost like that of a person being blackmailed, desperate to know 
that their tormentor is dead, and their secret is safe for ever.

Re-reading the photo chapter in OoP also reminded me of the 
mysterious Caradoc Dearborn, who vanished 'six months after this, we 
never found his body'. In JKR's world, I get suspicious when there is 
no body. Wonder what he was up to. The photo could have been taken 
six months before the events at Godric Hollow, all the deaths 
mentioned by Moody fit this timescale. 

Carolyn