Who can be in Slytherin Was: Re: Greatest Fear/greatest Hope

[hogsheadbarmaid]

No: HPFGUIDX 121515


Casey wrote:
I just wonder sometimes though, what would have happened if Harry 
hadn't met Ron on the train? Would he have been against Slytherin? 
Would he have fought the hat to *not* go there? The hat said Harry 
would have done well there, and only Harry's arguent kept him out. 
So, if there was no Ron to influence him, Harry would have gone to 
Draco's house gladly.
 

Alla replied:
 
Well, not necessarily. It could be that "something" inside Harry 
which we cannot decide what it is even after many discussions, 
would  have made him recognise Draco for who he is and still ask not 
to be  in Slytherin. 


Hannah:  

It's very interesting to speculate about what would have 
happened had Harry been sorted into Slytherin, though I still don't 
think he and Draco would have been good friends, or that he would 
have been any more inclined to join LV.  Also, Harry's anti-
Slytherin prejudice started long before he met Ron.
 
It was Hagrid, a supposedly responsible adult, who first told Harry 
that Slytherin was not a good house to be sorted into, and that 
every dark wizard was from Slytherin (which isn't actually true).  I 
think it was this that most influenced Harry, though Ron backed up 
his opinion.  Harry also disliked Draco Malfoy from the moment he 
met him, without even knowing what Slytherin was or that Draco had 
any connection to it.
 
But if it weren't for Hagrid and Ron, he certainly wouldn't have 
been anti-Slytherin, as he had no other sources of information to go 
on.  He wouldn't have fought the hat, as he wouldn't have had any 
reason.  But it's worth remembering that the hat doesn't say 
anything about Slytherin until Harry asks not to go there.  It may 
have never intended to put him there anyway.
 

Now the Barmaid:

I think Hannah's final point, that the Sorting Hat "doesn't say 
anything about Slytherin until Harry asks not to go there" is key and 
oft forgotten.  In this thread, and others, people often refer to 
Harry as fighting against the Sorting Hat in order to end up in 
Gryffindor and that simply is not how it happened.

I think it is also important to remember that the hat itself does not 
have an anti-Slytherin bias.  Remember, this was in fact Godric 
Gryffindor's hat to start with.  We often have set up Gryffindor and 
Slytherin as some sort of clear representation of a good and evil 
duality.  I think JKR is chipping away at this false dichotomy a bit 
more with each book.  And I think the Sorting Hat is one of the tools 
she uses to do this.

>From the Sorting Hat entry at the Lexicon:
"There is more to the Sorting Hat than one might think.  In an 
interview (http://www.infoplease.com/spot/harrypotter1.html)JKR said:
'The character you might be most surprised to see evolve is none 
other than the Sorting Hat.  'There is more to the Sorting Hat than 
what you have read about in the first three books,' Rowling 
says.  'Readers will find out what the Sorting Hat becomes as the get 
into future books."

It is the Sorting Hat that calls for unity among the houses and 
questions the wisdom of dividing and categorizing the students at 
all.  

I think that JKR's complex, nuanced ideas of both good and evil and 
good and bad will become more complex and more nuanced and I look 
forward to seeing what part the Sorting Hat has to play in all this!

   --Barmaid, who spent an embarrassing amount of time at a party 
last night holding forth about Harry Potter...