Half-Blood Prince

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 183863

> Carol:
> > > Stll, though, I find it annoying to have to search for
> > > explanations as to how a character could have known something.
> > > It's like Ron knowing that Draco had a Hand of Glory (which,
> > > canonically, he didn't because Lucius refused to by it for him)
> 
> Lynda:
> What I do not understand is why it is annoying to think, oh, I 
guess that
> Draco either asked his mother for the same thing, or went into town 
by
> himself when he was older and bought himself a Hand of Glory. I 
have never
> understood why some people have to have everything delineated to 
them to
> understand why. After all, real people go back to the store and buy 
things
> or have someone else purchase them for them. Is there any reason 
that an
> author cannot expect the readers of a book to make that same 
logical leap?

Magpie:
To be fair to Carol here, I don't think she's ever needed everything 
over-explained to her. I think her point about this small detail is 
just that it seems counter-intuitive to her. (Sometimes that happens 
and there's nothing you can do about it--like who was it recently who 
was saying that she's fine with Sirius' letter being in the house but 
can't stop getting stuck on the timeline the letter suggests to her 
about Sirius' present?)

Obviously Draco did just get the Hand of Glory at some point and the 
other kids knew about it and just never mentioned it in the story. 
It's not like it's impossible that he could ever have aquired it in 
the last 4 years. We've got enough details to know something like 
that happened (he has one, so he must have gotten it somewhere). But 
we did get told that Draco didn't have the thing, and then we never 
heard anything else, and then we had the kids talking as if they 
always knew he had it when they don't have much to do with Draco to 
begin with. 

Also, I suspect the reason for this little thing is JKR herself 
possibly getting it wrong. Because I remember once on her website 
*she* referred to the Hand of Glory that Draco "got in CoS" or 
something like that, when it's the Hand of Glory Draco *didn't* get 
in CoS. So I wouldn't be surprised if she thinks the explanation for 
why Draco has this hand and why the other kids know he has the hand 
is that we saw him get it in CoS and so did Harry, who then told his 
friends. Iow, it's  Flint that requires readers to come up with a 
correction. She remembered a scene in B&B with Draco seeing and 
asking for the Hand, and thought he bought it.

-m