Petunia's Eyes/Snape, Snape, Snape

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 169952

> > Magpie:
> > I agree. But that's why if I'm trying to figure out or guess 
what 
> > she's dancing around it seems logical to start with the facts 
she's 
> > giving me instead of doing my own dancing around exactly those 
> > things. If she says Petunia is a Muggle, that she has never done 
and 
> > never will do magic, how would I get anywhere near the answer if 
I 
> > don't start with that premise? Why not start with the idea that 
she 
> > is not someone who can do magic (and so not a Witch) but that 
> > perhaps shares other things with Squibs, who have certain 
> > sensitivities despite not being able to do so? She is a Muggle, 
> > but... doesn't to me imply "She is a Muggle but really she's a 
> > witch" or "She's a Muggle but that's only what she calls herself 
> > because she didn't want to be a witch" or "She's a Muggle but in 
her 
> > case only through choice..." Why not something that acknowledges 
the 
> > first fact but goes on to explain why she's not like other 
> > Muggles: "She's a Muggle but has experienced magic" or "She's a 
> > Muggle but has been given certain magical objects to use..." or 
> > whatever?

> Ken:
> 
> Perhaps I am not perfectly clear about what you mean by the above. 
You
> appear to be skating up to the same sort of guess that I made but 
from
> a different direction. Petunia is not a Squib, but .... Petunia is 
a
> Muggle, but .... The author is hiding something here. She long 
hinted
> at the importance of Lily's eyes. 

Magpie:
I wasn't skating up to any guess, actually. I was just saying that 
since Rowling doesn't flat-out lie in interviews I thought if she 
said Petunia was a Muggle I should assume she was a Muggle as we've 
always been given to understood the term in canon. It seems like all 
the responses to other things she's said where people put a lot of 
effort into making her say the opposite didn't work out--like the 
imo clear hints about R/Hr that were explained as something else. Or 
Snape isn't a vampire "that she knows of" or whatever she said was a 
hint that Snape was a vampire.

I'm not bothered by the idea of Rowling revealing Petunia to be a 
repressed witch in itself. It requires a whole lot of 'splainin' to 
make it work with her happily saying over and over that she's a 
Muggle--for instance, by suggesting that while Lily developed as 
every other Wizard we've seen by showing signs of magic before she 
went to Hogwarts, Petunia must have, for instance, been walking with 
Lily and seen the Leaky Cauldron and realized she and Lily were the 
only ones who could see it and somehow recognized this meant she had 
magical powers that she was thereafter able to repress so thoroughly 
that she didn't even show the uncontrolled signs other kids show. 
She can't even have been frightened by doing magic--she must have 
been frightened by, in this case, seeing a pub. And also the fact 
that canon says that Petunia, as a Dursley, has not a drop of 
magical blood must be just colorful language (even though in this 
series "magical blood" is a very real thing) because Lily and 
Petunia have the same blood. Except they get their blood from their 
parents, who are Muggles. So the parents must have magical blood 
too. Making the line "The Dursleys were what Wizards called Muggles 
(not a drop of magical blood in their veins)" really colorful.

I mean, I know that the split between Wizards and Muggles is not as 
clear as some Wizards would like because of Muggle-borns and Squibs. 
But it's so far seemed clearer than someone being able to be both at 
the same time. You say we just decide what we're going to call 
Merope, but it still seems clear to me that Merope, even at her 
death, has a abilities a Muggle can not have. Had she recovered, she 
would have recovered her abilities like Tonks did, presumably. Just 
as Petunia, if she's repressing her magic, is just as much a witch 
as Hermione is when Hermione's not doing magic.

Ken:
It would bother me a lot if this elaborate dance about
> Petunia is merely hiding the fact that she knows something she 
hasn't
> told Harry yet. That isn't something to hide, that is dead obvious
> from the text. Petunia knows tons of things about the magical world
> and Lily that she has never told Harry. If it isn't something more
> interesting than that, I can't see why Rowling was so careful in 
that
> interview. But then I also still hold out hope that there is more 
to
> the Lily's eyes thing than just batting them at Slughorn to get a 
memory.

Magpie:
But surely it's possible she *could* come up with something that was 
satisfying without Petunia being a witch--which wouldn't necessarily 
be that much of a bombshell to Harry anyway? I mean, even in this 
scenario Petunia is a Muggle for all intents and purposes, right? 
She's not going to do magic, ever. 

It just seems like okay, there's this question about Petunia being a 
Squib (who are not Wizards). This makes Rowling think of a secret 
about Petunia, something that's going to be revealed. What she tells 
us is: a) That this question hints at something that's going to be 
revealed b) Petunia is not a Squib c)Petunia is a Muggle d) There's 
more to her than meets the eye e) That all this is shockingly 
indiscreet. f) That Petunia has never done magic and never will.

So my point is, maybe we just have no clue and can't yet guess what 
the answer is because we don't have the information? Maybe the 
answer is just *more* surprising than what we readers can come up 
with based on our limited information. For us, there's only Muggle, 
Witch, Squib. Rowling didn't say "She's not a Squib; her parents are 
Muggles" or whatever. She said she was a Muggle (and why say that at 
all if that's the very thing she's concealing?). It doesn't 
necessarily have to mean that Petunia must be a different one of the 
three. Maybe the answer is something completely surprising and tied 
more specifically to the technical aspects of the plot rather than 
Petunia just being a different class of being.

I mean, the thing about Petunia just knowing what she's not telling 
is that what she knows would presumably be important. Where as while 
I can't say for sure that Petunia being a repressed Witch goes 
nowhere, it doesn't automatically have anything to do with Harry at 
all. Mrs. Figg being a Squib, for instance, didn't matter to Harry 
except that she was working for Dumbledore. Petunia is a Muggle with 
a long history with Wizards--she could, for instance, have had stuff 
done to her that are important. She could be involved in any number 
of magical things without being a witch herself. With the added plus 
that it wouldn't involve JKR lying or bending the definitions of 
words we've seen in canon even more than Wizards do casually 
(Neville and Merope are both referred to as Squibs when the person 
means is that they are incompetent with magic; Neville's family 
uses "all Muggle" to say they are afraid he is a Squib. But everyone 
knows what they mean.) 

-m