First lesson WAS: Re: Marietta, was Slytherin's Reputation

[montavilla47]

No: HPFGUIDX 185862

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Geoff Bannister" <gbannister10 at ...> wrote:
>
> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Carol" <justcarol67@> wrote:
> 
> Alla:
> 
> > > > Heh, of course not. I was saying that his fall was embarrassing
> > for > Flitiwick, not for Harry IMO.
> 
> Montavilla47:
> > > I would think it would be embarrassing for Harry as well--at least a
> > little and here's why:  The next year, Lockhart makes a bigger fool of
> > himself and Harry finds that highly embarrassing.  He also finds Colin
> > Creevey embarrassing.  You could argue that both of those people are
> > only embarrassing themselves--but it's evident that Harry *hates* the
> > attention that both of them bring to him.  
> > > 
> > > He even gets embarrassed by Ginny's attentions--and again, Ginny is
> > really only embarrassing herself.
> 
> Carol:
> > I agree with you, though I suppose having a dwarf dressed up like
> > Cupid and singing, "his eyes are as green as a pickled toad," made
> > Ginny's adoration the most intolerable of all.
> > 
> > Unfortunately, we're not given Harry's reaction to Flitwick's excited
> > squeak and toppling off his chair. Suppose that Harry had liked it and
> > felt flattered and wanted more of the same (as I suspect James would
> > have in the same situation)? 
> 
> Geoff:
> But he didn't. You can speculate on "what ifs" until the cows come home. 
> Harry didn't like it and he is not like James in that way.
> 
> Carol:
> > That, I think, would have been worse for
> > him by far than Snape's publicly exposing his ignorance (which is,
> > after all, no worse than most other first-years'). 
> 
> Geoff:
> The main facts are that Harry was an eleven year old boy who 
> had been downtrodden by his relatives for years and was suddenly 
> pitchforked into the wizarding world - a world which to him was 
> completely strange and in which he felt very uncertain.
> 
> At this point in time he was still trying to come to terms with being 
> a wizard. In no way was he revelling in his fame.
> 
><snip> 
> 
> We know from later events that Harry hates the limelight. Colin Creevy 
> drives him round the bend with his persistent stalking; he is very 
> unhappy when his name comes out of the Goblet of Fire and he 
> is very quick to let Scrimgeour that he, in no way wished to be the 
> Ministry poster boy.
> 
> What Harry wishes is not to be wanted or courted as the Boy-Who-
> Lived but to be accepted as just plain Harry and it is this which he 
> largely gets from Ron and Hermione and from most of the others in 
> his dormitory.

Montavilla47:
Glad to see that we are in agreement here.  

Geoff:
> Snape did not need to take him down a peg or  two. If he had had the 
> sense to actually observe Harry for a lesson or two, a great deal of 
> future confrontations, problems and misunderstandings would have 
> been avoided.

Montavilla47:
You are quite right that Harry didn't need to have his confidence 
deflated.  He didn't have any at this point.  My point--lo these many
days ago--regarding the "puncturing" of Harry is that Snape might
have been motivated *in part* by the way that *other students*
were looking at Harry.  That the celebrity around Harry might have
become a problem for everyone--or at least, things would be 
better all around if Harry were perceived as just another student.

And maybe I'm just being delusional so that there is some purpose
in this moment beyond Snape's issues shooting himself in the foot.
I like to think that Snape is a bit more on the ball than that.  Because
if not, then Snape is either a buffoon (like the principal in Ferris 
Bueller's Day Off), or the living embodiment of that flayed baby under
the bench, so twisted and stymied by pain that he's incapable of 
anything...  or he's an above-average teacher who will educate his
students no matter how much pain it causes them.

Geoff:
> There is an old English saying:
> "Some are born great. Some achieve greatness. Some have greatness 
> thrust upon them"
> 
> Guess to which category I think Harry belongs.

Montavilla47:
Guess how much it matters which one he belongs to.  Not one bit.  Either 
way, it's a big disruption to the school. something that Dumbledore 
specifically tried to avoid, and, the I figure it, Snape senses that the 
sooner it's dealt with, the better.