The Longbottoms

[Neri]

No: HPFGUIDX 158775

> Jen:
> <snip>
> Now to switch gears, I pulled the quote by JKR about the Lestranges 
> being 'sent' by someone because it keeps coming up in this thread. 
> Here it is, from the Rumours section of JKR's website: 
> 
> Q: The Lestranges were sent after Neville to kill him?
> 
> JKR: No, they weren't, they were very definitely sent after 
> Neville's parents. I can't say too much about this because it 
> touches too closely on the prophecy and how many people knew about 
> it, but the Lestranges were not in on the secret.
> 
> Jen again: She wrote this before HBP and now I'm puzzled about it. 
> If she's trying to keep Snape's knowledge of the prophecy secret 
> then there's an implication *he* was the one who sent the Lestranges 
> to the Longbottoms. It definitely sounds like the prophecy was 
> involved in the attack on the Longbottoms, but the orders were not 
> to kill Neville but go after the parents. ??? Now I'm confused.
> 

Neri:
Several months ago this subject precisely was discussed in a rather
heated thread (dictionaries where quoted
). See 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/150961
and down thread.

To make a long story short, I think the above quote sounds confusing
because we tend to assume that by the words "I can't say too much
about this" JKR was referring to the second part of her previous
sentence: "they [the Lestranges] were very definitely sent after
Neville's parents".  But I suspect that by "this" she was actually
referring to the *first* part of that sentence: "No, they weren't
[sent after Neville to kill him]". 

That is, IMO what she meant was "I can't explain that the Lestranges
couldn't be after Neville because I can't explain now that Snape was
the only DE who knew about the prophecy, so for now just take my word
that the Lestranges weren't in on the prophecy". This indeed makes
sense, while your interpretation above comes out like "I can't explain
that the Lestranges were sent after Neville's parents because I can't
explain that Snape knew about the prophecy and the Lestranges didn't".
This doesn't make much sense besides suggesting that Snape sent the
Lestranges (but didn't tell them why).

IOW I suspect that JKR was only thinking here about debunking the
theory that the Lestranges were after Neville because of the prophecy.
The question "who sent the Lestranges" didn't cross her mind at all.
She only used the word "sent" because the fan used this word in the
original question. She was merely trying to say here that the attack
on the Longbottoms had nothing to do with Neville and nothing to do
with the prophecy.

Neri