Dumbledore in book 7 (Was: It's more complex than that....)

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 164841

Ceridwen wrote:
<snip>
> Good catch, Steve!  I'm up for hearing anyone's take on this.  I 
> doubt Pensieve memories because, in my opinion, leaving something 
> like that or a letter lying around is just begging for the Bad Guys 
> to find it.  We don't know how much a portrait could recall from its 
> subject's life, so that's hit or miss (but I'm sure JKR can pull it 
> off).  Spirit presence like the Priori Incantatum (that was the GoF 
> effect, wasn't it?) or like Obi-Wan Kenobi is possible, but perhaps a 
> bit cheesy and 'been there, done that'.
> 
> And, there's always a Harry-absent chapter or two that might explain 
> things... <snip>

Carol responds:
But a Harry-absent chapter wouldn't be the way to deal with
Dumbledore, would it? (Snape and Draco, maybe.) As for Pensieve
memories lying around, they're not kept in a Pensieve, and I'm quite
sure DD made sure that all the Pensieve memories were back in his head
or their labeled vials (they have to be labeled, or he wouldn't know
Hokey's from Bob Ogden's) before he made the trip to the cave. I
half-expect DD to have willed Harry the Pensieve and some bottled
memories ("If I could put Time in a bottle. . . ," hint to CMC) that
he hasn't yet seen, preferably of DD and Snape.

There's Portrait!Dumbledore, who, unfortunately, may be of limited
use, and maybe some first-person narrative by Aberforth about his and
Albus's youth.

I used to think that Priori Incantatem on Snape's wand (it couldn't be
just Prior Incantato for a single spell, as he's already performed all
those spell deflections by the end of HBP) would be a way to get to
the memory of DD and have him recount the details of his own death,
with Harry as witness, but that would be hard to arrange. And a
Dumbledore Patronus, if a person could be a Patronus, wouldn't speak.
I suppose there's Dumbledore beyond the Veil if Harry makes the mythic
journey to the Underworld and back (foreshadowed in many of the books,
from SS/PS's third-floor corridor, where HRH fall down many floors to
a passage beneath the castle, and CoS's Chamber of Secrets to HBP's
cave). I suspect that Harry will encounter Dead!Dumbledore as well as
the spirits of his parents, and Sirius Black still in his body but
dead and unable to return. (Harry, I predict, will take Sirius's body
back, foreshadowed be taking Cedric's body back in GoF.)

BTW, another article on Leaky recently seems to suggest that Harry
will be attending Hogwarts for his seventh year despite indications to
the contrary at the end of HBP. In an excerpt from an old interview,
JKR says in part:

"He [Harry]'s going to be at Hogwarts for seven years. In the seventh
book he'll turn 17. In my wizarding world, you come of age at 17. So
in book seven he'll be allowed to use magic outside school."

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/#article:9483

Carol, who will miss Hogwarts as a "character" in the books and hopes
he'll spend most of the year there (and besides, the Hallows, whatever
they are, are probably at Hogwarts)