CHAPTER DISCUSSION: Chapter 29, Career Advice

[spaebrun]

No: HPFGUIDX 115868


Hi, this is Reed, emerging from lurkdom the first time in several
months to match her wit with the true Potter experts :-)

Dungrollin wrote:
> There's that comment of Sirius' that seems (to me) so out of 
> place: `...and James – whatever else he may have appeared to
> you, Harry – always hated the Dark Arts.' Harry isn't
> worried that his father was into the Dark Arts, that hasn't
> crossed his mind. He's worried that his father was an arrogant 
> bullying toe rag.  

Could Sirius perhaps thought that Harry *is* indeed worried about his
father being "dark"? The reasoning goes like this: James acted mean. 
Mean people are just the type who'd be drawn to Voldemort (see: Malfoy, 
Crabbe, Goyle). Voldemort is practically synonymous to Dark Arts.
We know that Harry didn't think this way, and I even doubt Sirius
*really* thought he would, but he wanted to establish firmly that 
James, despite his behavior, didn't belong to the 'wrong sort' (Malfoy 
type).

> Fast-forward to many years later, we come to the shrieking shack, 
> and it's Sirius and *Lupin* who are quite cheerfully going to
> murder an unarmed Pettigrew in cold blood.  Afterwards, DD says
> `I knew your father at Hogwarts and afterwards.  He would have
> saved Pettigrew too.'
> Hang on... James, the vehement Dark Arts-hater, would have saved a 
> snivelling traitor like Pettigrew, while *Lupin* (the nice guy) 
> would have committed murder without a second thought?

I think what is important here is that James was the victim of
Pettigrew's betrayal. Sirius and Lupin want to take revenge *for 
their friend*. They seem to consider this as their duty as friends 
and for them to neglect this duty would mean that they didn't value 
James's memory. James, however, as the one who it's all about, could 
have stepped in and stopped them, just like Harry did, thus renouncing 
his *personal* revenge. I believe the Lupin wouldn't have killed 
Pettigrew cold-blooded if it had been *him* (Lupin) who had been 
betrayed. Nor would Sirius - judging from how little he emphasized what 
Pettigrew had done to him personally (landing him in Azkaban).  


> The pantsing was during O.W.L.s, at the end of the 5th year, and 
> Sirius says that Lily started going out with James in the seventh 
> year (by which time he'd reformed enough to make Head Boy, too).
> So what was it that happened in the sixth year to deflate James'
> head, and turn him into Mr. Morality?

Could it be the famous 'prank'? It happened when Sirius was 16, so
probably in their 6th year. I imagine that this could have been the 
moment where James realised that they were overstepping the line of 
'practical jokes' and the experience could have changed his general 
behaviour quite a bit.   

Reed