Plot in OotP (wand confusion)

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 118392


Snow wrote:

> I don't think it is just a question of how heavy or awkward the 
> bundle is to hold with a wand at the ready but more so the
suspicious circumstances surrounding this particular instance. Harry
and Cedric 
> are 6 feet from where this cloaked person stops next to a marble 
> headstone when, conveniently for the scene, Harry's scar attacks him 
> to the point of blindness so Harry nor the readers see who it is that 
> attacked Cedric for certain. The next reference, although we know 
> that the cloaked figure holding the bundle had been but six feet in 
> front of them, Harry now hears a high cold voice coming from `far 
> away' above his head. Next Harry hears a swishing noise and a second 
> voice not directly identified as the voice of Wormtail, but we have 
> learned to assume it to be, saying the AK spell.  Harry resumes his 
> sight to find Cedric's dead body next to him and the cloaked figure 
> pulling him towards `the' marble headstone that had been spoken of 
> previous as to where the cloaked figure had stopped. Harry was tied 
> to the marble headstone by the cloaked figure, that he now realizes 
> is Pettigrew, and could not see anything that is directly in front
of him. Harry has a limited view of the whole picture throughout and as 
> he is the narrator of the scene has therefore blindfolded the reader 
> along with him. When these artful tactics occur, I personally tend
to be very suspicious. 
> 
> Snow

Carol notes:
I didn't snip your second paragraph as I hate it when my own ideas are
lost through oversnipping, but I'm really only responding to the last
sentence.

As I said just now in another post and have explained in great detail
elsewhere, Harry is not the narrator. This series is not a
first-person narrative but a third-person narrative with a limited
omniscient and not always reliable narrator who sees (usually) from
Harry's perspective. If the narrator were Harry, he would use "I," not
"he." 

You are certainly right, however, that Harry's perspective, though
voiced by the third-person narrator rather than by Harry himself,
limits our knowledge and occasionally distorts it. I think in this
instance it's because JKR doesn't want Harry to actually see Cedric
die and she wants him to associate the death with Voldemort (through
the pain in his scar) rather than with Wormtail. I still don't buy the
argument for two Wormtails (or any other conspiracy theory), but I
certainly question the reliability of the narrator at many points.

Carol, with apologies for harping on a point that she considers
important and hoping that she isn't boring people who would rather
talk about two Wormtails