Identity of "that awful boy"

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 183095

---  "Brenwen" <brenwen at ...> wrote:
>
> I was re-listening to OOP last night, and in Chapter 2, as 
> the Dursleys question Harry about Dementors, Petunia replies
> to Vernon's query - "What are Dementors?" by saying, "They 
> guard the wizard prison, Azkeban." At this point Harry, 
> dumbfounded, asks Petunia, "how do you know that?" and she 
> replies, "we heard about it from that awful boy". ...
> 
> I always believed the "awful boy" was James Potter .... But
>  now, ..., I believe she meant Severus Snape. ...

bboyminn:

I think we are intended to be mislead into believing that it
was James. I think the next line in that scene is Harry asking
Petunia something to the effect, 'if you mean my parents, why 
don't you use their names'. Again, because Harry is the Point
of View character, we are made to think the reference Petunia
made was to Lily and James. But Petunia never confirms or
denies specifically who she is talking about.

Later in book 7, in the Pensieve scenes that Harry views,
we see Petunia hiding while Snape explains about the
Dementors. That confirms to us who Petunia was really talking
about way back when. 

So, we are made by Harry interpretation to think it was James,
but we do find out later that it was most likely Snape.

Steve/bboyminn