Hogwarts Houses: Unite! (was:Re: The Power of Harry ...)

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 163690

> Betsy Hp:
> I do suspect that the ancient rift between the Houses will need to
> be dealt with. Otherwise the Sorting Hat's song in OotP will remain
> a gun that never goes off (IMO).  But I suspect that it's going to 
> take Harry's generation to heal the rift; that Harry will need to 
> work with a symbolic representative of each House in order to
> defeat Voldemort; 

Jen: I'm with you thinking JKR will address house unity in the 
current generation. We've seen Riddle's generation, including Hagrid, 
McGonagall and Eileen Prince (maybe Irma Pince <g>), couldn't do any 
healing and in fact made the split worse.  That's how I read it 
anyway, that Riddle isolated Slytherin even more by recruiting his 
first followers from his own house and making it more likely the next 
generations would follow the same path.  So by the time the 
Marauder/Snape generation arrived the house situation had grown 
extremely divisive, esp. between Gryffindors and Slytherins.

Plus there's that whole juicy tidbit about people being condemed to 
repeat history, first when the DA formed and then with Draco helping 
the DE's into Hogwarts.  In the first case the Slytherins were 
excluded by the choice of both sides (my guess), another battle in 
the ongoing war between the houses, and Slytherins chose to retaliate 
by joining Umbridge and working against the rest of the students.  
I'm expecting something similar happened to Salazar Slytherin, that 
the other three Founders begin to exclude him long before he was 
actually thrown out and he started to retaliate.

Draco finding a way to let 'evil' inside the castle in the form of a 
prejudiced hate-group infiltrating Hogwarts reminded me in a 
figurative sense of Slytherin bringing the basilisk inside Hogwarts.  
There's not a huge literal connection between the two acts, the 
situations are vastly different in their scope and Draco had little 
control over the situation once he opened the cabinent, unlike 
Salazar who knew exactly what he was building and for what purpose.  
Still, I had a sense of history repeating itself.

So I'm thinking JKR will take the house unity storyline back to the 
history of the Founders and then bring it forward to the current 
generation to learn how to stop the cycle.

Betsy Hp:
> and that the House breakdown will occur thusly:
> 
> Slytherin: Draco Malfoy
> Gryffindor: Ron Weasley (or maybe Neville Longbottom?)
> Ravenclaw: Luna Lovegood (or maybe Marietta Edgecombe or Cho Chang?)
> Hufflepuff: Zacharias Smith
> 
> Slytherin was easy.  No other Slytherin of Harry's generation has 
> such an intense and meaningful relationship (though of course all 
> negative) with Harry.  It's a perfect inversion (IMO) of the great 
> friendship between Godric and Salazar.

Jen: Yes!  This one is a given for your reasons and the fact that 
Harry started to see Draco in a *slightly* different way by the end 
of HBP, there's the sense that the ice might break a little between 
them.  I'd like to see them reach a detente and remain exactly as 
they are in their characterizations though, don't want a contrite 
Draco dragging himself back to Harry.  There's always been a sense 
Draco is talented in the way Hermione is, although maybe not as 
productive, and HBP pretty much proved that in my mind with him 
mending the cabinent and all the things he had to do to get the DE's 
into Hogwarts.  He just needs to direct his talents toward a better 
*cause*<g>.

Betsy hp: 
> Gryffindor could obviously be Harry himself.  But if Harry (as
> hero) is supposed to stand *in front of* a group representing the
> Houses it would make sense for someone else to hold the Gryffindor
> banner.  Ron is an easy guess since his family have all been 
> Gryffindors since forever (as per family legend anyway).  However,
> Neville has always struck me as the best example of a Gryffindor in
> the books.  So I don't want to rule him out.  (Especially if Ron
> and Hermione have another role to play -- another support behind
> Harry.)

Jen:  I'm liking Neville here, especially if Luna is the Ravenclaw 
since she's a little, um, strange to work with and Neville 
understands her better than most if the end of HBP was any 
indication.  But what about your favorite character, Ginny? Hehe, you 
didn't mention her.  Gack, I sincerely hope not though it's really 
unlikely she's letting Harry go on the quest without her if Hermione 
and Ron get to go and *especially* if a whole crowd of kids are 
involved.  

You were talking about all this in terms of the Horcrux hunt--maybe 
what will happen is when it comes to the actual locating of a Horcrux 
for each house, one person will represent that part of the quest, 
like soliciting Zacharias Smith specifically during the seach for the 
Hufflepuff cup?  I'm not sure if that would work since Harry and Co. 
know where the Slytherin locket is, not Draco.  The prospect *does* 
makes the Horcrux hunt sound more exciting, however it works out.

Betsy Hp:
> Ravenclaw depends on how easy we want to make it for Harry (or the 
> Trio).  Luna Lovegood (while a tad frustrating for Hermione, I
> think) would be pretty easy to work with, and seems the obvious
> choice given her experience in the DA.  But wouldn't Marietta and
> Cho make for some delicious conflict?  

Jen: Luna's easier to work with from a conflict perspective, but not 
in many other ways!  Cho and Marietta are gone from the story imo, 
maybe one or two references.  Luna's proven she can offer something 
the Trio--with their Heart, Mind and Soul--lack, meaning the power of 
Intuition.