Hermione's memory

[Matt]

No: HPFGUIDX 114097

Tina wrote in #114051:
> There is something up with Hermione's memory.  
> I've generally considered her very intelligent and 
> able to comprehend and retain what she has read but 
> now I'm wondering if there is more to it than that.  
> [Discussion of Hr's quotation in OP from DD's speech
> at the GF end-of-year feast.]

And, in #114057, noted the second reference to Hr's 
memory in an exchange with Ron in History of Magic 
class, in the same chapter.  

Dungrollin replied in #114061:
> Being able to remember things like that is a product 
> of concentration and understanding.  You have to be 
> listening ... and if you understand what's being said 
> it's an awful lot easier to remember.
> 
> The bits from Umbridge's speech that she recites are 
> not really very long, and they *are* the bits that one 
> who was concentrating on the speech ... *would* remember:
> ... "progress for progress's sake must be discouraged" ...
> "pruning wherever we find practices that ought to be 
> prohibited"?'  ....
> 
> And honestly, those phrases aren't complicated, if Ron 
> was trying, he'd have understood it and remembered it 
> too, but Umbridge is not a very interesting speaker ....

Most of the things Hermione remembers are perfectly natural for
someone with a retentive memory and an appreciation for rhetoric.  The
line of Dumbledore's (that LV's "gift for spreading discord and enmity
is very great. We can fight it only by showing an equally strong bond
of friendship and trust.") that Hermione recalls is memorable not only
for the insight about Voldemort, but also for the crisp antithesis
(discord/enmity -- friendship/trust) and the more subtle extended
chiasmus.  

As for Umbridge's lines, "progress for progress's sake" is memorable
largely for the attitude it expresses, though also coupled with a
rhetorical repetition of the term "progress" from the preceding
sentence ("...without progress there will be stagnation and decay"). 
But "pruning practices that should be prohibited" is such
self-conscious alliteration that it could not possibly be forgotten
(much like her earlier "tried and tested traditions often require no
tinkering"). 

I would wager that Hermione's vivid recollection for such turns of
phrase is intended as another of her autobiographical attributes -- a
reflection of Rowling's own self-image -- rather than as a talent of
magical proportions.

-- Matt