Smeltings' sticks

[Ken Hutchinson]

No: HPFGUIDX 168925

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "justcarol67" <justcarol67 at ...>
wrote:
>
> Dudley and his fellow Smeltings students wear uniforms that seem to be
> a parody of British public school uniforms (maroon tailcoats, orange
> knickerbockers, and boaters), but they also carry "knobbly sticks used
> for hitting each other when the teachers weren't looking" (SS Am. ed.
> 32). Clearly, it's a boys' school and Uncle Vernon hopes that it will
> make a "man" (i.e., an even bigger bully) out of Dudley.
> 
> Does anyone (preferably British list members) think that JKR is poking
> fun at British public schools, especially boys' schools, here? What do
> the Smeltings' sticks suggest or correspond to?
> 

Ken:

Goddlefrood would seem to be in the best position to answer of those
who have answered but he doesn't quite address the stick itself
directly. My only experience with being a subject of the Queen comes
from spending the summer of 1988 in Baldock, a small town 40 miles
north of London, on a job assignment. The Smeltings Stick seems to me
to be just the sort of ceremonial and traditional accessory that some
British public schools would have, whether any have an actual school
stick or not. I also remember a friend who attended the University of
Missouri at Rolla. He joined an engineering fraternity there and
during his pledge week he was required to carry a stick with him at
all times. This hardly proves the matter but many of our traditions do
come from Britian. 

Even more so it reminds me of something that actually did happen while
I was living in England. We tuned in the BBC news on TV one evening to
find that a major scandal had happened that day in the House of
Commons (I think, but it could have been the House of Lords). They
have a large ceremonial mace that plays some mysterious (to a Yank)
role in the legislative process. During the heat of a debate the MP
holding the sacred mace got very, very angry and hurled it to the
floor in disgust. My, I thought we'd never hear the end of that!!

Of course in the United States we tend to be less ostentatious and
more direct. So on May 22, 1856, when Representative Preston Brooks of
South Carolina had had enough of Massachusetts Senator Charles
Sumner's attacks on slavery he waylaid him on the floor of the Senate
chamber and beat him nearly to death with "a light cane of the type
used to discipline unruly dogs".

I imagine this only scratches the surface of the history of sticks in
our schools and legislatures. It might be hard to know exactly what
Rowling had in mind when she introduced the Smeltings Stick. I only
know that the brief section of the series where it appears is a
hilarious one!

Ken