Slytherins come back WAS: Re: My Most Annoying Character

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 180227

> zgirnius:
> Harry never expressed an opinion as to whether any Slytherins 
> returned with Sluggie or not. 

Magpie:
Harry's not expressing any opinion in this sentence (though if 
you're referring to that one sentence I don't see why Harry's 
opinion wouldn't be that it looked like shopkeepers, Charlie, 
Slughorn and friends/family of non-Slytherin students were there, 
period). The narrator is telling us, using the usual limited pov, 
what's going on. And all I'm saying is that when I read the scene I 
read the way I always do, which is to read the words that are there. 
I don't read a sentence like this and then think of all the other 
things that it's not saying. This is proving a negative. It doesn't 
matter imo if Harry would allegedly not recognize members of his own 
class that we know by name because the narrator has casually used 
their names in the past (back when Harry was able to recognize them--
the same way he manages to recognize random Death Eaters and other 
minor characters throughout this battle and the way he managed to 
name "the Slytherins" earlier this same night)? 

I just don't read a sentence telling me that Slughorn has entered a 
room with Charlie Weasley, shopkeepers, and people related to non-
Slytherin students and say--ah, but he didn't NOT say Slytherin 
students who have not been mentioned since they were scene leaving 
earlier (oh, except for Voldemort saying that those students came to 
join him) so that means they are there too! Or "maybe one of those 
people from Hogsmeade used to be in Slytherin!" Arguments about how 
Harry doesn't care about naming individual students get even further 
afield, because there's no reason he had to do any such thing 
(though he would be perfectly capable of it if the author chose to 
do it that way, contrary to arguments that seem to imply that the 
author was somehow incapable of writing what's really happening 
because Harry lacks this ability).

Honestly, who reads like that? Who reads a sentence telling us 
that "the next group to try out for the team were Hufflepuffs" and 
thinks that's telling us anything but that the next group of people 
were Hufflepuffs because Harry doesn't know everybody, or might be 
mistaken, or is obviously wrong because this is the Gryffindor try-
out? 

zgirnius:
 
> As Harry expressed no definitive opinions of the subject of 
whether 
> Slytherins came back, it is not canon that he was "wrong", as you 
> seem to suggest. Since he may not have been "wrong" there is no 
need 
> to show he was.

Magpie:
Harry's not be interviewed here, he's not being asked to give any 
opinion of who came back. The narrator told me what Harry looked up 
and saw just as the narrator does throughout the scene and I 
processed it like, imo, any normal reader who's been told who just 
entered the room. Just as I was told that the House Elves (not 
including a group of Goblins Harry didn't recognize) entered the 
battle or who's fighting with what Death Eater. Of course I can't 
claim that the Slytherins couldn't have been there based on that 
sentence--that's proving a negative. By that logic everybody from 
Dobby to Viktor Krum to Mark Evans *could* be there. It's not a 
contradiction to say they're there because she didn't specifically 
say they weren't there (except logically by having them leave and 
never be mentioned again returning). But I don't think it's in any 
way radical to say that since the author actually said that it was 
one group of people entering the room, and never said anything about 
these other people, it does not say in the book that they were 
there. This is a pretty consistent view for me in reading, I think, 
because I can remember taking this same position against many other 
fan readings that had no positive representation in the text but 
came down to "but it doesn't say it DIDN'T happen and I can explain 
why working backwards!"

zgirnius: 
> Harry is shown having no surprise at Phineas's "Slytherins played 
a 
> part", and he is shown as stating that the House is an acceptable 
one 
> for his son to be Sorted into at a later date. 

Magpie:
Harry already knows "Slytherin house played its part" regardless. 
The book showed Slytherin playing its part without any mention of 
actual students returning to fight here. The line makes sense 
without those students--it has to, because the book never actually 
mentioned the Slytherins returning and the line was still there. 
Harry refers to one of those other things when he tells his son he 
doesn't care what house he's Sorted into (wonder why his son is 
worried?)--which I think any decent father would have said no matter 
what and is of course followed by the assurance that if you don't 
want to be in Slytherin you won't be there. No real change from Book 
I that I can see. 

zgirnius:
So either he thinks 
> Slytherins came back, or he thinks the presence of school aged 
> Slytherins in the battle is irrelevant to him in judging the House 
in 
> light of the actions of Regulus, Sluggie, Andromeda, and Snape 
(among 
> others whose actions Harry may have an opinion about).

Magpie:
That statement in no way leads to his thinking Slytherins came back 
since we've never heard of such a thing. It can easily refer to 
these other people--especially Snape since that's exactly what Harry 
refers to here. He says nothing about any Slytherin students 
returning to join the battle, which puts him in good company since 
it's never mentioned by anyone anywhere.

zgirnius: 
> Either way, Our Hero has learned, like the Hat and the author 
> suggested, that not all Slytherins are bad, and that the Houses 
must 
> all play a part to defeat Voldemort.

Magpie:
Which still does not change that sentence in canon to say that 
Slughorn came back leading a charge of Slytherin students. 

-m