CHAPDISC: DH3, The Dursleys Departing

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 177159

Laura (kneazlecat54) wrote:

> CHAPTER DISCUSSION: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
> Chapter 3, The Dursleys Departing
<snip>
> Hestia tells Harry that Mad-Eye will give him the details, but that
the Dursleys must leave so that they will be far enough away to
Disapparate at the same moment that Harry leaves Privet Drive for
good, thus breaking the protective enchantment that Lily gave him.
<snip>

Carol responds:
Except for Petra's comments, it looks like I'm the first to respond! I
hope you don't mind my pointing out here that the protective
enchantment that's ending is Dumbledore's, which was based on Lily's
blood protection. IIRC, the blood protection still exists (except
that, thanks to the drop of Harry's blood in Voldie's veins, Voldie
can touch Harry now). It comes into play again when Harry sacrifices
himself later in the book.

QUESTIONS
> 
> Oh, the Dursleys
*shakes head*

Carol:
Yup. Those Dursleys. Can't change--or can they?
> 
> 1.  The way Vernon calls to Harry speaks volumes about their
relationship.  What strikes you about this and what do you think it
means?  Is Vernon's behavior here consistent with that in the other books?

Carol:
I don't recall him saying, "Oi, you!" before, but the refusal to use
his name is in character, essentially, a refusal to acknowledge
Harry's humanity or relationship to the family, IMO. I decided to
check SS/PS to see how much if anything had changed in their
relationship (other than Vernon's fear of Harry's powers increasing
with each year and his ability to bully Harry steadily decreasing) and
found that he addresses Harry as "boy" in that book, too, and speaks
of him in third person as "the boy." Essentially, Vernon wishes that
Harry didn't exist and pretends that he doesn't whenever possible.
Beyond that, he attributes to worst possible motives to Harry. (Either
Harry will blow up the house (SS/PS), no doubt following his parents'
fatal example, or he'll steal the house (DH). Vernon's values are
those of a stereotypical middle-class conformist property owner
suspicious of the WW. Here, he's torn between what could happen if
Harry is telling the truth and suspicion that Harry is lying. The only
two people with any influence on him are Dudley and Petunia--exactly
the situation in SS/PS and all the other books, especially PoA (the
Aunt Marge incident) and OoP (the Dementors).
> 
> 2.  Although Vernon is the chief disciplinarian at Privet Drive,
clearly it is Petunia who sets the tone of the family's relationship
with Harry.  We learn in Book 1 that it is her rage and resentment
towards Lily that is playing out in her treatment of Harry.   What do
you think Petunia sees when she looks at Harry, and how does it make
her feel?

Carol:
I thinks there's more to it than her rage and resentment toward Lily,
not just her jealousy and thwarted desire to go to Hogwarts (it really
is a sad situation, unpleasant though Petunia is) but also her
knowledge of what will happen if she violates her implied contract
with Dumbledore. He must have told her that she and her family would
be in grave danger if anything happened to Harry--IOW, I think that
the blood protection extended to them while he was in the house or
called it home. She has a clearer idea than Vernon does of the power
of wizards. As for what she sees when she looks at Harry, I think she
sees exactly what most of the other adults do: James with Lily's eyes.
James, however, is (to Petunia) only the apparently unemployed wizard
who married Lily and died with her, maybe even caused her death by
marrying her. Lily is the once-loved sister who was loved more than
Petunia and got to go away to Hogwarts. I think that suppressed love
of Lily is what caused Petunia to take Harry in. But what she sees is
not just the sister she lost, the sister she both loved and hated, but
the world that she wasn't allowed to enter and could never be part of.
She conceals those feelings under the "furious pretense" that the WW
doesn't exist or pretends to share Vernon's view that it's abnormal,
but it's really sour grapes, and twice (SS/PS and OoP) she lets her
feelings and memories escape her. (Imagine if Harry had told her that
Severus Snape, "that awful boy," grew up to "murder" Dumbledore! I
think she's feel validated in her judgment of Lily's childhood friend
and the world she chose to live in. The threat of the DEs also seems
to validate that judgment.)
> 
> 3.  Many of us expected a confrontation between Harry and Petunia in
DH, but instead, Jo (as she usually does) surprised us by giving us
Petunia's back story in another context.

Carol:
Erm, did you forget to ask a question here?
> 
> 4.  What do you think she would have said to Harry had she chosen to
speak at this time?  Will Harry and Petunia ever see each other again?
 Is there unfinished business between them?

Carol:
It's just possible that she would have said "I'm sorry," but she can't
bring herself to do it after all these years, or maybe even to admit
to herself that she's mistreated her sister's son. I wish she could
have showed him a photo of herself and Lily or let him read the letter
that was tucked into his blankets, but the glimpses provided by
Snape's memories are probably the only insight into Petunia's
childhood that Harry will ever have. I doubt that they'll see each
other again. Maybe they would exchange nods but not words, depending
on whether Petunia was with Vernon (who would ignore Harry) or Dudley
(who would say hello). If she was alone, she'd probably do exactly as
she does in this scene: look at him, hesitate, and turn away.
> 
> 5.  After Dudley's encounter with the dementors in Book 5, fans
wondered what experiences Dudley relived.  From Harry's point of view,
Dudley had never had a moment of fear, doubt or sadness in his entire
life.   But something life-changing happened to Dudley during that
encounter, as we see in DH.  What do you think Dudley saw, and how did
it change him?

Carol:
But Harry should know that Dudley's life hasn't been all peaches and
cream. He'd been both frightened and harmed by wizards twice before he
encountered the wizards. So I think he was hearing either Hagrid or
the Twins, probably Hagrid, who is not only magical but a "giant" in
Dudley's eyes. I don't think what Dudley heard (not saw--aren't
Dementor-induced memories only sounds?) changed him. What caused his
view of Harry to change was his recognition that Harry had saved his
"life" (he never grasped the idea that Harry had saved his soul, maybe
because it makes Harry sound like a Fundamentalist preacher) and is
therefore not "a waste of space." For the first time ever, Dudley felt
gratitude. (He had never felt that sentiment in response to the gifts
that his parents showered on him; he probably thought that indulgence
was his right as their son.) I don't think he's introspective enough
to feel remorse, but I think he vaguely felt that Harry was his cousin
and part of the family and maybe they ought to be nicer to him. Poor
Dudley: if he only had a brain. He could so easily have become a
Muggle Crabbe; he's very fortunate that Harry saved his "life" and
altered his perspective to the extent that it was possible to do so.
 
> 6.  What was your reaction on reading Dudley's unexpected defense of
Harry?

Carol:
Disbelief. In fact, I wondered whether the book might be weaker than
its predecessors, filled with moments that required the willing
suspension of skepticism (forgive me, Coleridge!). Then I decided to
read on, feeling for once almost exactly what Harry was feeling.
However, by the time we got to Harry's impulse to threaten him with
magic, I thought Harry was a bit dense (which is my usual reaction to
Harry, who tends to be a bit slow on the uptake). Once I got used to
the new Dudders, I rather liked him (though not enough to want him in
the rest of the book). I thought having Harry call him "Big D" was a
nice touch.
> 
> 7.  Do you see Dudley and Harry having any further contact
throughout their lives?

Carol:
It's possible that Harry might see Dudley in Muggle London, but I
doubt that they'll be exchanging Christmas cards, much less inviting
each other to tea. It will be like seeing an old acquaintance from
your school days--a quick hello and exchange of information (jobs,
marriage, kids) and a "See ya around."
> 
> 8.  How would Dudley's worries about Harry affect his relationship
with his (Dudley's) parents?

Carol:
Do you mean after the Dursleys were taken to safety? I don't think Big
D would have any more worries. Dedalus and Hestia would assure him
that Harry was safe. He'd be more concerned about having nothing to
do--no friends, no computer, no TV. He might even be happy to return
to school to make up his missed year when those ten long months were
up. I think the relationship is likely to go back to normal, with the
adult Dursleys anxious to please their very discontented teenage son.
> 
> 9.  Compare Dudley's dementor experience with that of Bellatrix or
Barty Crouch Jr.  Can we learn anything about the moral awareness of
these characters by their reactions to encounters with dementors?
Other characters have different kinds of reactions-think of Hagrid,
for instance.  How would someone like Mundungus Fletcher react to them?

Carol:
It took me awhile to understand this question. I think that Bellatrix
in Azkaban would have had some protection from the Dementors through
Occlumency (she knows enough to teach Draco the basics), and I think
her certainty that she had acted rightly in searching for Voldemort
would have helped her in much the same way that her cousin's clinging
to his innocence helped him. Perhaps there was no true happiness for
the Dementors to steal from her, and no doubt her mental stability
(such as it was) suffered like her looks from those years in Azkaban,
but neither she nor her fellow escapees completely lost their minds
and gave in to despair. Barty Jr. was younger and less certain of his
cause (at least, while he was in Azkaban); he was also more of a
coward and had his father not foolishly yielded to his dying wife's
wishes, I think he would have died there of despair. But moral
awareness has nothing to do with it; Bellatrix is evil, but it's an
"evil, be thou my good" sort of philosophy. She believes in Voldemort
and that belief helped her to survive. (By the time the Dementor sucks
his soul, Barty Jr. is as certain of his rightness and as devoted to
Voldemort as Bellatrix, but he's unconscious when the Dementor sucks
his soul; moral awareness has nothing to do with it. As for Mundungus,
he'd be as fearful as Dudley and probably as helpless; it's hard to
imagine him casting an effective Patronus against a Dementor, and yet
he must have known how to cast one to communicate with his fellow
Order members.) Hagrid, we know, reacts in the same way as Dudley,
feeling that he'll never be happy again and remembering the worst
moments of his life. Again, moral awareness has nothing to do with it.
The only defense, aside from a Patronus, is an ability to close your
mind in some way. (Being able to transform into a dog helps, too.)

> 10. The ways in which Harry arrives at and leaves Privet Drive every
year are significant.  What are your thoughts on this?  Think of the
way he first came to the Dursleys' home in PS and the way he left in
DH.   Think also of the ways he leaves and returns in each book. What
can we learn about Harry from this?

Carol:
Oh, my. It would take me a whole post just to list the different ways
he leaves and returns, much less to analyze their significance.
Obviously, he's placed on the Dursleys' doorstep by Hagrid, who's
riding Sirius Black's motorcycle, so that story arc comes full circle
as he leaves forever with Hagrid, this time sitting rather comically
in the sidecar. I laughed even though I knew he was going into danger.
And, of course, this departure is reminiscent of the one in OoP, where
Mad-eye says that if anyone is killed, the others should keep
flying--a bit of ironic foreshadowing of Mad-eye's own death that
probably few of us recognized at the time. Let's see: the Flying Ford
Anglia, the Knight Bus, the Weasleys, the Order, Dumbledore, the Order
again. If there's a pattern, I don't see it except that Harry is in
trouble during the second, third, and fifth books, and is driven to
King's Cross by the Dursleys exactly once. The rest of the time he's
usually being rescued in one way or another for one reason or another.
Not very self-sufficient yet, but then again, he's underage.
> 
> 11. How the Order was operating since Dumbledore's death?  It didn't
seem to be much of democracy while he was alive.  How would decisions
be made without him?

Carol:
Mad-eye seems to have been in charge until his death. After that, the
Order members seem to be operating more or less independently, doing
little more than making wireless broadcasts and providing safe houses
protected by Fidelius Charms. By March, Mr. Weasley, three of his
sons, and even Kingsley have quit their jobs and are in hiding. Snape,
of course, still has a job to do, but no one knows he's working for
Dumbledore. McGonagall, of course, is also still at Hogwarts doing
what she has always done (and undermining what she sees as the Snape
regime). Only when the DA summons the Order to Hogwarts, do the Order
members come out of hiding and fight, with Kingsley stepping up to
take charge.
> 
> 12. Did you wonder what would happen to the Dursleys' lives while
they were in hiding?  Would Vernon lose his job?  How would their
bills get paid?  Or were you happy to see the back of them?  *grin*

Carol:
I figure that the Dursleys own their house so they won't lose it, but
the water and electricity will be turned off. I hope for their sakes
that Kingsley informed the Muggle authorities that the Dursleys had
left town and weren't dead or kidnapped. Otherwise, their lives will
be in an uproar when they get back. I don't see how Vernon could help
but lose his job, but a good Confundus Charm from Dedalus when Vernon
returns home could "convince" his boss to rehire him. I think that the
fate of the Dursleys is a detail that JKR didn't concern herself with.
She figures that, like Harry, we'll feel that we're well shot of them.
Still, I hope someone removes the rotting meat from the freezer and so
forth, or conditions will be pretty unpleasant for the neighbors as
well. And Mad-eye just left the door unlocked. Sure, a locked door is
no protection against DEs, but what about run-of-the-mill Muggle
burglars and vandals? I wouldn't want to be a Dursley returning home
from this little vacation.

> 13. In PS and CS, Hedwig travels directly from Privet Drive to
Hogwarts on the train along with Harry.  In books 3-6, she is free to
fly about on her own for a while before meeting Harry and returning to
school.    Here, she is confined to her cage and not happy about it. 
Did you see this as a foreshadowing of her fate in the next chapter? 
 Was it meant that way?

Carol:
I don't see it as foreshadowing. I think it's the last semblance of
normalcy. Harry has already (apparently) lost Hogwarts. He's losing
the only other home he's ever known and feels odd about leaving.
Later, he loses both Hedwig and his Firebolt, the last connection with
his childhood, as well as the Order member who seemed least likely to
die, having endured so much. Even the Weasley Twins will never be
identical again. So, no foreshadowing here, just Hedwig being her
usual self, petulant when she's not free. Had he let her fly to the
Weasleys, she might have survived. Or maybe not, if the DEs were
watching the neighborhood. Her death, like Cedric's, like Sirius
Black's, like Harry's parents', is completely unexpected and shocking,
like so many deaths in real life. It helps to prepare the reader and
Harry for more deaths to come: Mad-eye, Dobby, Fred, even Snape, all
of whom die suddenly and unexpectedly. One moment, everything is
normal, or seems that way. The next, someone Harry knew and in some
cases loved is gone forever.

JKR's writing, and this book in particular, may have many flaws, but
the depiction of death is not one of them. She is ruthless, without
sentimentality. She understands the suddenness of death and the pain
of the survivors. And yet, from the whispers behind the Veil in OoP to
the words on the tombstones in Godric's Hollow, she offers hope as
well, as least for humans, at least for wizards. And Hedwig, as Hagrid
says, lived a happy life. I don't think she suffered. That's the only
comfort Harry receives. Hedwig is gone, and with her, his childhood.

Carol, with apologies for the length of her responses and for jumping
ahead to the next chapter