Draco's bigotry and leadership

[rlai1977]

No: HPFGUIDX 144739


> > Betsy Hp:
> > I've said it before, literature is not anthropology.  If an author 
> > chooses to show us something, the very fact she took the time to 
> > write it suggests a certain significance.  While, yes, Draco must 
> > bump into his fellow Slytherins all the time, JKR *chose* to have 
> > the mab show him with Pansy and Blaise.  
> 
> a_svirn:
> Oh, I think it's significant alright. Here we have a long 
> anticipated Slytherin who is not in hurry to join Voldemort. And he 
> does seem smarter than Draco.

Jumping in here...

I too think Blaise is smarter than Draco in terms of his command of 
words and logic, and that, I believe was the reason JKR brought Blaise 
into the particular scene you and Besty have been discussing about- 
Draco just couldn't have carried on the sort of conversation he had 
with Blaise with Crabbe, Goyle and Pansy, given how Rowling has 
characterized the latter three. The most important purpose of said 
conversation was to give Harry (and the readers) some clues as to what 
Draco Malfoy's secret mission would be, THIS, I could imagine being 
done via Draco boasting as per usual to his closest friends. But 
another purpose of the scene, I think was to signal that Draco Malfoy, 
a character we'd known from book 1 and whose behaviors/personalities 
had had remained pretty constant before now, was about to change 
because he just had to:

- For the first time, the name Malfoy not only would not help Draco, it 
became a hindrance for him. 

Blaise was there to inform Draco that his dad's DE status had made 
Slughorn shy away from him- Crabbe/Goyle wouldn't have been invited to 
Slughorn's little gathering in the first place, and Pansy? Even if she 
could've been invited had JKR invented a powerful family connection for 
her, wouldn't have dreamt of hurting her beloved Draco's pride by 
telling him the actual reason he was unwanted.

I highly, highly doubt the scene was to showcase "a long anticipated 
Slytherin who is not in hurry to join Voldemort", for Blaise merely 
pointed out that a *16-year-old* would unlikely be of any use/interest 
to the Dark Lord. And if he was all that anti-Voldie (as you seem to 
imply), he'd hardly have bothered to converse casually with a DE's son, 
nor called Ginny a *blood traitor* :-P

RP