CHAPDISC: DH1, The Dark Lord Ascending

[Zara]

No: HPFGUIDX 176247

> Ceridwen:
> I think Rowling didn't want to have an emotionally charged death so 
> early in the book.  She may have thought that readers thinking the 
body 
> dangling above the table possibly being someone we know was enough 
for 
> an opening gambit.  Bait and switch, sudden relief when she was 
someone 
> we had never met.  We also get the previously dead Bathilda 
Bagshot, 
> whose name we've heard before but who we have never met, around 
halfway 
> through.  The really emotional deaths all happen toward the end, at 
the 
> Battle of Hogwarts.  I think that was to give the ending more of a 
> punch.
> 
> I wish I'd thought of this question, Geoff!  I'd love to see what 
> others think.

zgirnius:
I wonder whether Charity's name might not make it into future volumes 
of PoA.... I think she was in retrospect a logical person to kill, 
because it sets the scene for the Muggle Registration and other 
bloodist policies of the puppet Ministry, and it provides a job 
opening for Alecto Carrow.

And I think she wanted to kill someone, to make tons of points. How 
evil Voldemort it, that Draco is still ambivalent, how evil Snape is 
not to be disturbed (on reread, what an amazing actor), reintroduce 
the nasty Nagini, and more. I'm not sure it is the sort if thing she 
had worked out in her outline, hence lack of need to mention her back 
in PoA, when Hermione actually had her for a class.

I disagree a bit about the deaths. Hands down, no comparison, the 
most impactful death was Dobby's, which is more towards the middle - 
three Horcruxes left to go, not counting Harry). For me, anyway. 
(This from a Snape fan who always thought Dobby was annoying!)