World Building And The Potterverse

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 167644


Magpie:
 Even more, I could swear JKR once 
> referred to the Hand Draco got "in CoS" when really she just established it 
> existed and Draco had seen and liked it. It could have been handled easily 
> by just having them describe the shrivelled hand and have Harry say it's the 
> Hand of Glory and explain what it does, having been there in CoS, rather 
> than having Ron suggest they have reason to know Draco has a Hand they'd 
> have little reason to see, but know he has because they remember the B&B 
> scene.

Pippin:
The interview quote:
Question: Did you ever make a study of herbs and other Hogwarts 
subjects, or did you create all those classes from inspiration?
J.K. Rowling responds: Most of the magic is made up. Occasionally 
I will use something that people used to believe was true — for 
example, the "Hand of Glory" which Draco gets from Borgin and 
Burkes in Chamber of Secrets.

http://www.accio-quote.org/articles/2000/1000-scholastic-chat.htm

This is from 2000 a year after CoS was published. 

It seems she was  telling us, way back then,
that Draco did get a hand of glory from Borgin and Burkes during 
CoS (though he didn't get it in the scene we saw.)  I don't
think it's even the same one that's described in CoS --
that would be why Ginny calls it a shrivelled arm, whereas what Harry
saw was a withered hand on a pillow. 

As Ron expects Ginny to remember what a Hand of Glory is, and
she wouldn't have been included in the Trio's discussions of
Draco's visit to B&B's, it seems he thinks she should have
independent knowledge of it -- and why should she not? After
all, it's like Nicholas Flamel, a bit of real world knowledge that
even a Muggle might be aware of. 

This seems to me no more than the sort of confusion that was 
sown when the pub Harry and his friends frequented in PoA was 
the Three Broomsticks, while Hagrid had said in PS/SS that the 
pub in Hogsmeade was The Hogs Head. 

There was a lot of debate over whether that was a Flint, but
it does seem to have been planned all along that there were
two different pubs -- and no real reason why there shouldn't have
been, except storytelling convention. Jarring, it was, but
goshdarnit, it's the storytelling convention that's illogical not
the circumstances. JKR just delights in setting up situations 
where following convention instead of logic is going to lead 
us in the wrong direction. 

I don't think the Draco story is all  about him learning to
be independent of his father. It's tempting to see Draco's
character note as that scene in  Flourish and Blotts where Draco 
and his father sneer with identical expressions, but that's a bit
of a red herring. As others have pointed out, Draco does defy
his father as much as he thinks he can get away with. He
talks incessantly about Harry, sneers at him in public, wishes
he could find out who the Heir is so that he could help him,
and all in defiance of his father's wishes.

The note that defines who Draco is comes earlier, IMO, in PS/SS, 
in Draco's first scene, when Draco didn't sound sorry that 
Harry's parents were dead. 

Draco wasn't trying to be offensive. He was still trying to make 
friends and hadn't discovered who Harry's parents were. He
was a boy who knew nothing of death and had never been 
taught that it should mean anything to him. Wanting the hand
of a hanged corpse for a plaything was part of that. 

Pippin