NotKillingWormtail/SnapeAtXmas/Draco/Virgin/HBPbook/repliesToPostsInLiteratur

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

No: HPFGUIDX 162863

Lupinlore wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162661>:

<< Neville handing Bellatrix over to the Aurors would be silly and
unbelievable, and a complete mirror of Harry's single greatest mistake
-- not letting Sirius and Remus kill Wormtail, thus avoiding this
whole mess. >>

The kids are more advanced mages now than they were in PoA, and
Neville would presumably Stupefy Bellatrix rather than merely tie her
up, or he could use Petrificus Totalus, which Hermione used on him in
first year -- why didn't Hermione think of it in the Shrieking Shack?
Sirius was driven mad by Azkaban, but why didn't Lupin think of using
magical restraints on Pettigrew? Alas, that sounds like an argument
for ESE!Lupin.

Even if Wormtail didn't escape, Barty Junior could have brought
Voldemort back only a few months later than Wormtail did. (Barty
Junior escaped on his own during the Quidditch World Cup). Not in time
to catch Bertha Jorkins and hatch the Triwizard Tournament plot, but
in time for Polyjuice!Barty to snatch Harry from among the audience of
the Third Task to the Graveyard, where Voldemort could re-embody
himself with the flesh of a servant who did not have a life-debt to
Harry. Oops, this is starting to sound like MAGIC DISHWASHER.

Anyway, Neville using Cruciatis on Bellatrix is unlikely to prevent
her escape.

Carol wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162746>:

<< Also, if Wormtail hadn't restored Voldemort, Barty Crouch Jr. might
have done so, and if neither had done so, the situation would never be
resolved. Harry can't fight and defeat Vapormort. >>

We agree about young Barty, but it being a good thing that Voldemort
was re-embodied so that he can be killed sounds like MAGIC DISHWASHER.
I prefer the PS/SS Dumbledore: "Nevertheless, Harry, while you may
only have delayed his return to power, it will merely take someone
else who is prepared to fight what seems a losing battle next time --
and if he is delayed again, and again, why, he may never return to power."

Zanooda wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162731>:

<< I've also always wondered how Sirius and Lupin intended to kill PP.
Were they about to AK him or what? >>

As they both rolled up their sleeves, I think they were planning
something messier than AK. More spurting blood. "Accio heart!" should
splatter far more than just forearms, as I think would levitating a
grand piano over him and then smashing it down on him. Perhaps Charm a
bedspring into a sharp knife and stab him? Perhaps order one of those
magical ropes to twist around his neck and strangle? Strangle him with
the rope the old-fashioned Muggle way?

<< If they were, that would be the end of Lupin too, wouldn't it? >>

Some listies think that murder gets a long sentence in Azkaban even
without using an Unforgiveable. Pippin thinks ESE!Lupin takes that
risk to silence the one witness against him. I think Lupin wass paying
for his previous wrong belief against Sirius by sacrificing himself to
Sirius's revenge, and perhaps hoping that both he and Sirius having to
be in hiding for the rest of their lives will cause them to be hiding
TOGETHER. The only thing that has ever cast doubt on my Sirius/Remus
ship is Sirius not leaving him anything in his will, and currently I
like to either pretend that didn't happen, or assert that werewolves
aren't allowed to inherit under Umbridge's additions to wizarding law.
In the latter case, there ought to be a note to Harry somewhere asking
him to take care of Remus.

Chrusotoxos (Golden Arrow? Is that DC or Marvel?) wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162700>:

<< After all we've never seen Snape at Christmas (am I right here?) >>

In CoS, we saw Snape's Christmas cracker's wise choice of funny hat to
give him: an old witch's hat with a vulture on it. At the Yule Ball,
he was taking points from students for making out in the rose bushes.

I think he's been at Hogwarts at Christmas every year that Harry has
been. I would say it's part of the House Head's job, except I don't
think Professor Sprout is always there.

Magpie wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162735>:

<< destroying his body in a wood chipper (which naturally would get
Draco off scott free...err, somehow) >>

Not a wood-chipper. Transfiguring it into a bone and burying the bone
in Hagrid's vegetable garden. That has worked before.

Dave Jim Chocolate Friar Tuck wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162816>:

<< Harry Potter started as a series intended for children, but as the
writing gets progressively older, will Harry face Voldemort as a
virgin? I say he will, as teens and sex are a whole new "cauldron" of
troubles, but others are adamant that he will be a man against
Voldemort in every possible aspect... >>

I can't believe JKR would write about Harry having sex. Because it
seems quite clear that she cannot write well about sex. 

I personally would have liked for Harry to learn sex via a fling with
Tonks, but she's set up Tonks betrothed to Remus and Harry in love
with Ginny, and she won't have her good guys having sex outside the
"true love" relationship.

Sherry wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162852>:

<< Anyway, it's taken me a long time to be able to put my feelings
into words on this subject, and I'm curious to see what other people's
first reactions were to Harry's reactions to the HBP. >>

I thought (and still think) that the charms on that book included one
to repel all eyes but Severus's and Lily's (it repelled Hermione
emotionally and Ron by being unable to read the handwriting) and one
to seduce Lily's eyes (so we watched Harry, who has Lily's eyes, being
seduced).

Wynnleaf wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162855>:

<< nor did I think of Harry as being taken over by the Prince. That
would be more like Ginny and the Riddle diary in COS. >>

Which I think is why JKR originally thought of putting the HBP
'thread' into CoS.

Pippin wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162689>:

<< I think we'll have to wait for the judgement of the ages on whether
they're art. James Branch Cabell's books were wildly popular and far
more literary than the Oz books which were popular around the same
time, but aside from a brief revival in the sixties, you don't hear
much about Cabell anymore, while The Wizard of Oz is now deathless and
continues to be influential. >>

I don't think that becoming part of the common cultural heritage of
all USAmericans is proof of literary/artistic quality. Unless one is
convinced of the literary/artistic quality of Superman, Batman,
Spiderman, the villain with waxed moustache tying the heroine to the
railroad track, the fastest gun in the West, "Comet! It makes you
vomit! Get some Comet and vomit today!" and so on.

Your comparison of Baum (and continuators) versus Cabell does reply to
a thought I've often had (altho' I can't think of any examples off the
tip of my tongue) that one great advantage in the "contest" to become
part of the common culture is to be EARLIEST. It does, however,
correlate with another great advantage being to be adapted into a
movie that was shown annually on network television as long as there
were only three networks (were? was?).

<< But I'd say that JKR introduces what seem to be stock characters
and situations, then does something unexpected with them, exposing in
the process how much we prefer relying on convention to keeping an
open mind. >>

Examples, other than ESE!Lupin?

Steve bboyminn wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162718>:

<< The most technically and literarily perfect book can be dull as
paste, >>

How dull is paste?

Carol wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/162750>:

<< If Literature meant "boring high-brow pseudo-intellectual writing
in which the author is intent on proving (at least to himself) that he
is smarter than you," it would largely be confined to James Joyce. >>

It seems to me that that is the definition of Literature used by that
guy (I don't remember his name and I didn't read his book) who
complained so loudly about Oprah choosing his book for her Book Club
that she withdrew the choice. I vaguely recall hearing soundbites from
him to the effect that he was trying to write a piece of literary art
to be read and evaluated by only a few highly qualified literary
readers, and that his book had been put in danger of not being read by
the people for whom it was intended because they figured that anything
that ordinary people (for whom his book was not intended) were willing
to read couldn't possibly be any good.