Harry's bias again, answering several posts

[Ceridwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 141001

Geoff:
> I agree that we are seeing things from Harry's point of view but this 
> incident is not written in reported speech after it happened but as 
> a "real time" event so, if Snape's words are being accurately 
> recorded, then I believe there is no room for a positive spin.

Ceridwen:
Even as real-time, we only get Harry's perspective.  If Harry is doing 
what he's supposed to be doing, he wouldn't see what's going on with 
Hermione and Neville full-time.  He'd be concentrating on his own 
potion.

No, I don't see how this would be able to be changed.  And I doubt if 
now we'll see anything this peripheral, which apparently is meant to 
set Snape's character in Harry's and our minds.  It's probably just a 
fun exercise at argument, nothing more.

But, the overall argument remains - I am not sure if what I've been 
shown through the Harry filter, is accurate.  I know that at some 
point, as Alla mentioned, it is.  And I know that at other points, it 
isn't.  So, other than what has been proven (broom hexing and other 
like incidents) to be either wrong or right, I don't know whether I've 
been given the correct information, or led astray.  Until it's proven, 
I don't know.  I can assume, but I can't know.  The best I can think 
is, I'm not supposed to see beyond what Harry thinks, as in a detective 
story.  I'm supposed to think it over for myself, find some objective 
standpoint, and move on from there if I want to see whether I'm being 
misled or not.

I guess that's what we're all doing, with various theories 
or 'straightforward readings', getting around the Harry filter.  Still, 
it does leave me off-balance.  It seems at times that the narrative is 
almost first-person, then it steps back (as someone mentioned, to show 
Harry's flush where he wouldn't have noticed it), or steps between the 
objective and the extremely personal.

I know it's probably just me, other people seem to have latched onto 
the changes very well.  But I do find myself in mistrust of the 
narrative a good number of times.

Ceridwen.