sex/VanishingCabinet/SoulsEtc/Badger/Ch.2/ThinAir/Choices/Stag/deadHouseElves

Sun Sep 11 04:42:23 UTC 2005

No: HPFGUIDX 139951

houyhnhnm wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139608 :

<<  In fact there is such an absence of adult sexuality in the books,
that until HBP, with its delicate references to Merope's interesting
condition, I wasn't sure that wizards reproduced in the ordinary
mammalian fashion. >>

Maybe I just have a dirty mind -- when Molly in GoF reminisced of
being out to 4am on a date with Arthur in their school days, I felt 
it was obvious how they had lost track of so much time, and I have
suspected that Harry and Neville were both 'accidents'.

Vivian wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139906 :

<< Also, it's interesting that Zabini's mother is a sexual predator.
She's been married "7" times and each man dies mysteriously. (Black
widow spider comes to mind.) I think this kid is a sexual predator,
too. >>

I think Blaise's mother is a financial predator rather than a sexual
predator, because sex is her method but cruel sexual gratification is
not her goal; inheriting the rich wizards' fortunes is her goal.

Which kid is a sexual predator, Blaise? Did he do anything in HBP
except stand around looking pretty and saying racist remarks?

Susan O'Bones wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139695 :

<< Up until the vanishing cabinet at Hogwarts got broken, it and its
partner in B&B would have been what they became again in HBP -- a
direct route into the school from B&B, a very Dark and nasty place.
For all the magical charms and enchantments that have always been
protecting Hogwarts, here is a HUGE security hole. What in the name of
Merlin was that thing doing in the school? How long has it been there?
How did it get there? Who brought it in? Dark and nasty wizards, no
doubt. Lucius Malfoy and his ilk. >>

Maybe Phineas Nigellus owned the pair and installed one in his office
or his sleeping quarters at Hogwarts, from which it was removed when
one of his successor redecorated, and installed the other someplace he
wanted quick access to, maybe the Black House (12 Grimmauld Place),
from which one of his heirs sold it to B&B. 

I have trouble imagining Phineas Nigellus giving up his dignity by
*crawling* through a cabinet just to avoid using a Portkey or walking
out of the Hogwars grounds to Apparate, so maybe he had set it up for
someone to come frequently to him. Who? With my above-mentioned dirty
mind, I imagine a girlfriend or boyfriend he's keeping secret from his
wife -- in which case, there had better not be any paintings in the
room they use. Or maybe it's for *sending* annoying students away to
someplace where they'll be punished worse than by Filch's predecessor
and 'the old punishments'.

Is 'Vanishing Cabinet' the illogical name of cabinets that always 
come in pairs and act as Transportation Cabinets, Short Cut Cabinets,
Secret Passage Cabinets? Or is a REAL Vanishing Cabinet a singleton
that serves as an excellent garbage disposal, and each of these two
Wormhole Cabinets was mistaken for one Vanishing Cabinet?  

Saraquel wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139703 :

<< Who is wondering if she is fighting her way through thicket and
bramble only to find herself at a dead end with a sheer cliff in front
of her, and everyone else looking up at her from the path below,
thinking, Why? >>

I *hope* you don't find a dead end. I think that magic power is
outside (as you said, like the ether) and a person or object 'having'
magic power really mean having an ability to *direct* and *focus*
magic power. I would like to understand the relationn between mind,
emotions, soul, memories, and the ability to use magic power, so I
hope you discover it and report back to us.

Saraquel wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139763 :

<< (memory is a property of soul) >>

Lupin said of the Dementor's Kiss: "You can exist without your soul,
you know, as long as your brain and heart are still working. But
you'll have no sense of self any more, no memory, no ... anything.
There's no chance at all of recovery. You'll just ... exist. As an
empty shell." 

Someone on another list commented: << Well, Lupin definitely seems to
be saying that the soul and the mind [mind = self] are the same thing.
But then, how can Lord Voldemort retain all his powers and memories,
as Dumbledore says he does, if his has ripped his soul into small
pieces and has hardly any of it left? >>

To which I replied: 
<< I think Lupin meant that the mind and the sense of self cannot
survive without a support-system, normally a soul, but possibly a mind
could be transferred to a magical device like the diary without
transferring a bit of soul with it. >> (TMR might have put his
memories into the Diary before he learned about Horcruces and put a
bit of his soul into it, too.) << And that memories cannot survive
without their support-system, normally a mind, but we have seen them
survive in Pensieves and bottles. But if a Dementor sucks out your
soul, there is no time to transfer your mind and memories to a magical
artifact before they die for lack of their support-system. >>

Since then, I've been wondering if a DK victim is more like a person
in a coma or like a zombie. A zombie has no sense of self and no
memory EXCEPT it can obey fairly simply orders like 'weed this field'.

<< "However, he was the able-bodied servant I needed, and poor 
wizard though he is, Wormtail was able to follow the instructions I
gave him, which would return me to a rudimentary, weak body of my 
own, a body I would be able to inhabit while awaiting the essential
ingredients for true rebirth 
 a spell or two of my own invention
... a little help from my dear Nagini <snip> a potion concocted from
unicorn blood, and the snake venom Nagini provided 
I was soon
returned to an almost human form." (snip) "the means that I used to
break the Memory Charm upon her (Bertha Jorkins) were powerful, and
when I had wxtracted all useful information from her, her mind and
body were both damaged beyond repair. She had now served her purpose.
I could not possess her. I disposed of her." >>

I am very fond of the theory that LV either used poor Bertha's womb as
incubator to grow his UglyBaby!Voldie body (with Pettigrew semen as an
ingredient along with unicorn blood and snake venom), or used her body
as raw material to make a Frankenbaby body, but you seemed to have
disproved that with canon, alas.

Of course, I also was quite certain that Fourth Man Avery was true. 

<< why Voldemort looks like a snake >>

Voldie has many connections to snakes, being a Parselmouth, loving
Nagini more than he loves anyone else, and looking like a snake. I
don't doubt that his Animagus form would be a snake, but I think the
underlying reason for his many connections to snake-ness is because
Snake is a traditional symbol of immortality (because of the metaphor
of shedding its skin).

Ali McJ wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139712 :

<< Why a Badger? >>

I always remember a bit in the T. H. White 'King Arthur' story. When
(w)Art was an unimportant boy, Merlin educated him by Transfiguring
him into different animals, including a badger; then when he pulled
the Sword from the Stone, all the animals reminded him of their
lessons, and IIRC the Badger's reminder was about physical strength:
"Put your back into it!" Which would go along with Helga Hufflepuff
being a hard worker.

It's an English badger, related to weasels, who digs in the earth to
make its underground home, like La Gatta Lucianese said *miao*, not a
Japanese badger, related to dogs, who likes to eat fruit and transform
into a human in order to drink alcohol and play tricks on people. 

Wikipedia says some interesting things about badgers: <<The lower jaw
is articulated to the upper, by means of a transverse condyle firmly
locked into a long cavity of the cranium, so that dislocation of the
jaw is all but impossible. This enables the badger to maintain its
hold with the utmost tenacity.>> <<Because of their fidelity and
gentle nature, badgers are seen by some as a symbol of love and
loyalty.>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badger_%28animal%29

Catkind wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139739 :

<< Then there's my favourite Chapter 2. Firstly, we see that JKR
*does* ask herself the same sort of questions that readers ask.
Bellatrix's list of questions and Snape's replies to it could have
come straight off this group. >>

I thought they *did*! This group or Mugglenet or Leaky Cauldron or
Lexicon forums or letters to her c/o her publishers. My reaction to
reading that part was a big happy grin to think that Rowling was
speaking to *us* obsessive fans by answering our questions.

Saraquel wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139763 :

<< One thing that has always puzzled me about the Potterverse, is the
apparent ease with which objects can be magicked out of thin air. From
chairs and inanimate objects (many examples, DD in Harry's hearing) to
organic things like food (Sandwiches in CoS) right up to living birds
(Hermione in HBP). >>

Many of those things could real objects transported from another place
by magic rather than conjured objects created ex nihilo by magic. The
chairs and squashy purple sleeping bags would have been in storerooms,
the food in the kitchen (already prepared and put on the plate by
House Elves). I dunno if I can argue that Hermione's birds were
transported from another place...

Vivian wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139771 :

<< JKR's comments that "it's our choices that determine who we are" is
also something that we should never forget. >>

Did JKR say that about 'our choices determine who we are' in an
interview? As Cathy Drolet has posted, Dumbledore said 'show', not
'determine', as in the following ancient and nearly perfect post:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/23598

From:  "Aberforth's Goat" <Aberforths_Goat at Y...> 
Date:  Sat Aug 4, 2001  12:47 pm
Subject:  Re: [HPforGrownups] Re: Calvinism

<< Not so fast! The CoS passage actually has some of the most
"Calvinistic" passages in the canon. In fact, it was that passage 
that got me thinking about this. Let's pull it out for exegesis:

*  "Exactly," said Dumbledore, beaming once more. "Which
*  makes you very different from Tom Riddle. It is our choices,
*  Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities."
*  Harry sat motionless in his chair, stunned. "If you want proof,
*  Harry, that you belong in Gryffindor, I suggest you look more
*  closely at this." [....]
*
*  "Only a true Gryffindor could have pulled that out of the hat,
*  Harry."

So: Harry's choices *reveal* something--they peel the layers off the
onion--they show us the person he actually is. His true identity, his
soul, his platonic essence. And that person is, fundamentally, a
Gryffindor. He may not even have known it, but there's a white hat in
his soul and when it comes to a crisis, he'll wear it.

Elyse wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139838 :

<< why was James a stag? Out of all the animals he could have been,
for instance a lion for bravery - would have brought out the regal
showman in him alongwith his courage. >>

A stag with his antlers is traditionally as much of a symbol for regal
showmanship, courage, and violence as a lion is. Long ago there were
whole messes of posts about medieval people believed that Stags were
big enemies and defeaters of Serpents and therefore used Stag as a
symbol of Christ.

Linda Budd wrote in
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/139884 :

<< houselves heads are mounted on their masters' walls (like deer
heads) when they die; I believe that was in book 4, Black's castle. >>

That's a Black family tradition, which Sirius said was started by his
Aunt Elladora. I don't believe anyone else disposes of the remains of
deceased House Elves that way -- I don't Lucius allowed Narcissa to
import that custom to Malfoy Manor, and if there were House Elf heads
mounted on the walls of Hogwarts, Harry would have noticed them by
now.