Dumbledore's Magnaminity

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 143130

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "rklarreich" <rklarreich at a...> 
wrote:

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "rklarreich" <rklarreich at a...>
wrote:

Roberta:
> To reinforce what a_svirn wrote in reply to this quote, all this
> proves is that Petunia and Vernon made an educated guess, based on
> Harry's parentage. They could only have known *for sure* that he
was
> a wizard if Dumbledore specifically told them so in his letter, and
> as we do not know the contents of the letter, we cannot assume that
> he did so. If he didn't, then the Dursleys guessed that Harry had
> probably inherited his parents' abilities and decided to try
> to "stamp it out of him" preemptively.

<snip>

> Well, Harry's parents have just been killed by Voldemort, who tried
> to kill Harry too but got vaporized instead, and in order to
protect
> Harry from further attempts on his life by remaining Death Eaters,
> Dumbledore would like Petunia to take him in order to seal a charm
> Dumbledore has cast involving Harry's mother's sacrifice. That all
> seems like reasonable background information to put in the letter.
>
> Beyond that, we can speculate that Dumbledore also told the
Dursleys
> that Harry has definitely inherited his parents' magical ability
> (which Dumbledore would know, having privileged access to the
> Hogwarts Quill) and that when he is eleven he will be offered a
place
> at Hogwarts. It is certainly reasonable to expect that Dumbledore
> would place this information at the Dursleys' disposal from the
> beginning, as a courtesy, but until we see the actual letter, this
is
> all speculation, NOT canon.

Geoff:
Yes, but the reactions of both Vernon and Petunia...

"We swore when we took him in we'd put a stop to that rubbish.....
Wizard indeed!"

"Knew!.... Knew! Of course we knew...."

(PS "The Keeper of the Keys" pp.43-44 UK edition)

...are too extreme to suggest that they just guessed. Petunia's
vitriolic reply and the triple use of "knew" is too strong. I think
that if your scenario was correct, she would have said something like:

"We guessed what you'd be like..." or

"When odd things started happening, it was too much like my dratted
sister..."

There is also evidence that Dumbledore had had to tell the Dursleys
something of what had happened to Lily and James...

"- and then, if you please, she went and got herself blown up and we
got landed with you!"

(ibid.p.44)