Dumbledore's age

[zanooda2]

No: HPFGUIDX 176762

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "melhersheybar" 
<mhersheybar at ...> wrote:

> Another problem with math and DD's age that is much bigger, IMO, is 
> the fact that he dueled with Grindelwald in 1945 when, according to 
> jkrowling.com, he was 64 years old. <SNIP>
   
> Yet, when talking to Harry about Grindelwald, he mentions watching 
> GW become more and more powerful for something like five years, 
> before he finally realized he would have to fight him. <SNIP>
  
> I always read this to mean that he and DD dueled within 5-10 years 
> of their parting


Hi, Mel! Somehow I never thought that LV and GG dueled only five 
years after they parted ways.  They were both only seventeen when 
they met, and it seems unlikely that by age twenty-two GG already had 
so much power, and built an army, and made bad things happen in 
Europe :-). Besides, first he spent some time looking for the Elder 
wand, I suppose.

DD didn't say anything to Harry about "five years", it's from Rita's 
book: "... Dumbledore delayed, for some five years of turmoil, 
fatalities, and disappearances, his attack upon Gellert Grindelwald" 
(p.359). I take it that they were five years after GG made his move 
against continental wizarding society, not five years after Ariana's 
death.

I think there are a few hints in the book that many years passed 
between GG's flight from Godric's Hollow and the duel.
 
"Barely two months into their great new friendship, Dumbledore and 
Grindelwald parted, never to see each other again until they met for 
their legendary duel" (358). 

"... Albus never saw him again, not until forced to do so by the 
pleas of the Wizarding world. Neither Dumbledore nor Grindelwald ever 
seems to have referred to this brief boyhood friendship in later 
life" (359).

Sorry to quote Rita as a reliable source :-), but I believe that she 
at least got those details right! 

As for DD, he only says to Harry ("King's Cross") that "years passed" 
and also that he "delayed" meeting GG, but he also says that he was 
offerd the post of Minister several times in the years before he 
dueled GG. I don't think they started offering the post to DD when he 
was seventeen, or even twenty-two, even if he was a genius and all 
that. 

That's why I believe that "five years" were the years the wizarding 
society spent "pleading" with DD, according to Rita, and not the 
years that passed between Ariana's death and the duel.


zanooda, who thinks that this is not one of JKR's mistakes :-)