Harry at the Dursleys

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 118460


> Carol responds:
I think that's a misreading. What Dumbledore actually says, after
explainig why he placed Harry with his aunt instead of a Wizarding 
family that "would have been *honored* and delighted to raise [him] 
as a son" (OoP Am. ed. 835) (his priority, as you say, was to keep 
Harry alive,835), is 
"Five years ago, then, you arrived at Hogwarts, neither as happy nor 
as well-nourished as I would have liked, perhaps, yet alive and
healthy. You were not a pampered little prince, but as normal a boy 
as I could have haoped under the circumstances. Thus far, my plan was
working well" (837).
As I see it, he's *glad* that Harry is not a pampered little prince, 
a condition he *contrasts* with Harry's normalcy. 


Alla:

It is not a misreading, Carol, it is how I read this quote. It is 
one of the possible readings. As Lupinlore said earlier, we are 
missing the tone of Dumbledore's voice.

I read "but as normal boy as I could have hoped under 
circumstances " as Dumbledore's regret about the fact that under 
those circimstances Harry could not have grown up as normal boy, who 
could be a little bit spoiled and loved.