CHAPTER DISCUSSION: Chapter 28, Snape's worst memory

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 116425


khinterberg wrote:
<snip>

>> Sorry for me to beat a dead horse (or cockroaches), but I went
back and reread this portion of the book. I was struck by this quote
at the very end of the chapter:
>
> "What was making Harry feel so horrified and unhappy was not being
> shouted at or *having jars thrown at him*--it was that he knew how
it felt to be humiliated in the middle of a circle of onlookers..." (p
> 650, OotP US paperback) 
 
Alla responded:
> > <snip> I love that quote. <snip> I think it is possible that jar
exploded due to wandless magic, but Snape throwing it still seems more
likely
> 
Potioncat added:
<snip>
> I really like the wandless, uncontrolled magic idea, but I think 
> that last quote killed it. <snip>

Carol notes:
Except, of course, for the possibility that Snape throwing the jar is
Harry's perception rather than what actually happened. Harry has no
experience of anyone other than himself performing accidental magic as
the result of inadequately suppressed fury. At any rate, that quote
occurs at the end of the chapter, as hindsight, not during the
incident itself. I really can't see Snape, no matter how angry he is,
deliberately smashing a jar of cockroaches in his own office. After
all, he's the one who has to catch them and put them back. I can,
however, visualize him being so angry that he *wants* to throw
something and the force of his anger exploding some object that he'd
really rather had stayed intact.

Carol