CHAPDISC: HBP 2, Spinner's End

[Ceridwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 142080

> Elyse: Oh the chapter was so full of images, and they all had an 
> impact. The snakelike cords, the interplay of shadow and light, the 
> pale trembling hands of Narcissa and the infamous twitch...
> But I want to know exactly where in canon it says Narcissa 
> is "wraithlike". She is described as slim, not skinny. Slender, 
yes, 
> but skeletally thin, no.
*(snip)*

Ceridwen:
I'm not sure if I'm the only one, the first one, or one of a few who 
mentioned 'wraithlike' Narcissa.  But, I know I did.  Not in relation 
to her size, though, but more atmospherically:
adj : lacking in substance; "strange fancies of unreal and shadowy 
worlds"- W.A.Butler; "dim shadowy forms"; "a wraithlike column of 
smoke" [syn: shadowy]WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton University (from 
dictionary.com)

I think the entire set-up of Spinner's End is written with an eye to 
the eerie, the ethereal.  All of the images I noticed at first, and 
the ones I pick up on each reading, makes this seem more like 
Hallowe'en than July.  I see Narcissa as a wraith, in this context, 
(also from dictionary.com):
An apparition of a living person that appears as a portent just 
before that person's death. 
The ghost of a dead person. 
Something shadowy and insubstantial.
(The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth 
Edition
Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved)
It just feeds the feeling I'm getting from the chapter.  That's all.

Thought I'd nip this before it became like canon.

Ceridwen.