How dim is Harry? - his official History

[Eustace_Scrubb]

No: HPFGUIDX 98432

Kneasy wrote:

> The  Dursleys told him that his parents had died in a car crash;
> why would he question that? Sounds feasible, if tragic. He then
> finds out, at the same time that an escape hatch from the
> stifling world of Privet Drive opens, that this was not true. Not
> only  that, but  that he is famous, that everybody knows his
> name and that Hagrid, his rescuer, has a very different story
> to tell, that he is mentioned in the history books, for goodness
> sake. 
> 

Now Eustace_Scrubb:
Well, I'm afraid I agree with just about everyone (there must be
something wrong).  I do think Harry learned that survival with the
Dursleys included keeping his head down and _not_ asking questions, as
Steve suggested.  I do think JKR limits Harry's questions to keep us
in suspense (maybe too often), as vmonte added.  But I also agree with
Kneasy that, within the story, it strains credibility to think that
Harry wouldn't at least look himself up in the books Hermione
mentioned.

However, let's go one more step...what would he have learned exactly?
 Historians, alas, don't always tell the truth; they don't always do
good research; their work may be co-opted to reflect official opinions
and negate those not accepted by the hierarchy.  Sometimes historians
fill in the gaps of evidence with imaginative inferences--sometimes
they get them right, sometimes wrong.  They rarely get the whole
picture.  (I'm a historian myself, so I'm not saying this without some
careful thought and knowledge of the field).

So from what we know of the WW, how likely is it that the works of
history Hermione cites give a full, truthful, factual account of the
first war with Voldemort and its end?  If it really did that, we'd
hardly need 7 books over 10(?) years to tell Harry's story.  We know
that History of Magic as taught to Hogwarts students consists almost
entirely of dry chronologies with perhaps a few hagiographies of great
wizards and witches thrown in.  (I guess JKR couldn't have had many
decent history profs in school.)  We also know that the Ministry is
able to influence news coverage greatly, and the Godric's Hollow
affair is nearly contemporary from a historical point of view, one of
the hardest kinds of history to get right--there's no historical
distance, everyone has too much emotional investment in the subject.

So while I would have expected Harry to at least sneak a look in the
library, I am not optimistic that he would have gained any great
insight into his own history from the official versions.  I doubt that
even Ms. Know-it-all was good at critically reading a work of history
at age 11, so it would have been easy for both Hermione and Harry t
come away with wildly incorrect notions of what happened that night.

That's _my_ story and I'm sticking to it...until convincing evidence
to the contrary comes up, that is.

Cheers,

Eustace_Scrubb