Theory on Petunia

[Ken Hutchinson]

No: HPFGUIDX 156592

justcarol67  wrote:

> Spoiled Dudley had his tongue swollen and nearly choked on it in GoF.
> He was nearly soul-sucked by a Dementor in OoP and, IMO, relived the
> toffee memory, surely his most terrible moment, as the Dementor came
> near him. In HBP, he was merely knocked on the head by a glass of mead
> and possibly terrified by the sight of a filthy house-elf, but his
> "privileged existence" may be threatened again in Book 7. Nothing to
> do with his having magical abilities. The point JKR has been making in
> these scenes is that he *doesn't* have them and, bully or not, is
> powerless against magic.

Ken:

Dudley has given some testimony on what he experienced when the 
dementor attacked him. In general he describes feeling horrible, 
cold, really cold, and as if, as if , as if you'd never be happy again?, 
the last with help from Harry. A little more specifically he says it was
dark, everything was dark and then I heard *things* inside my head
(emphasis Dudley's). When prompted to describe what the things said
he is unable to. If you can pull a toffee out of that scene my hat's
off to you. I don't think the toffee was that big a deal to him and
he certainly would be able to talk about the toffee incident. Whatever
he saw was horrible, not being the butt of a practical joke. I bet it relates
to something he has done while bullying someone else. Or, maybe he 
has had the tables turned on him at that fine exclusive school he attends
and is the habitual victim of hazing by older students. He'd not want
to talk about that with his folks.

No, you are not alone in loving that scene where Mrs. Figg goes
Berserker with a bag of cat food tins. I love everything about
Mrs. Figg. I've got a Galleon that says shes the one to do magic
late in life.

Ken who should probably look up how much a Galleon is worth
before anyone takes that bet!