To kill or not to kill and resolutions of the storylineWAS :Re: Disarming spell

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 185505

jkoney wrote"
> I think at one point or another we have all agreed that Harry isn't
 the most reliable narrator.

Carol responds:

Forgive me, but Harry isn't the narrator at all. I agree that the
third-person limited omniscient narrator, who usually but not always
sees from his point of view, is not always reliable. But I wouldn't
want an omniscient narrator who knows everything that the author
knows/ It's more fun if Harry gets things wrong or only partially
right (especially regarding Snape) and the narrator reports them
through his eyes. We're surprised when he is and learn when he does
(unless, of course, we've learned to distrust his perspective(,

jkoney: 
> The line about the quidditch tryouts illustrates that Harry doesn't
know that many people in the school. He has his close friends, his 
dorm mates, quidditch people and the people he attends class with.
Other than that, I don't even think he knows everyone in Gryffendor.

Carol responds:
I agree. He doesn't even know all the Slytherins' names (Hermione has
to tell him who Tehodore Nott is). He has slightly more excuse for not
knowing the Ravenclaws since he has no classes with them before sixth
year. But, as you say, he doesn't even know all the Gryffindors.
Cormac McLaggen has been in Gryffindor the entire time that Harry was
there and he doesn't know who he is. And the narrator, seeing through
Harry's eyes, talks about young Gryffindors in terms like "a
first-year, by the look of her." So, yes. Harry's attention is
confined to a very select group of friends or acquaintances--or
enemies or Quidditch rivals--all of them within a few years of his own
age. (The only reason that he knows the Creevey brothers is that their
small size and their enthusiasm for Harry make them stand out.)

jkoney: 
> So when he sees the people coming to the fight he calls them friends
and family memebers because he doesn't know who they are (as in what
house) but he knows they are coming as support for his side.

Carol responds:

Exactly. He has no time to identify specific people other than fat,
mustachioed Slughorn and red-haired Charlie Weaseley. Otherwise, he
sees *what looked like* all the families and friends of all the
students who remained to fight for Hogwarts. But the only people who
had a chance to bring in friends or family were the (older)
Slytherins, who could Apparate out of the Hog's Head. They must have
had their hands full, by the way, Side-Apparating the younger
Slytherins home and then coming back for more. Maybe Zacharias Smith
redeemed himself a little by helping with the younger Hufflepuffs. I
can only hope that a few Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw Prefects came along
to keep order and that someone also helped the younger Gryffindors. If
Slughorn had to get them all home by himself, how did he have
sufficient energy to return to the battle?

Anyway, to return to the point, I don't see who they could be except
friends and family of students who evacuated to the Hog's Head and
then returned, most of whom would be Slytherins. But since virtually
everyone is wearing pajamas and dressing gowns, how is he supposed to
know who's a student and who isn't, much less which House they're in?

jkoney: 
> So if he had spent the time to recognize that there were slytherins
in the group I think we would be discussing how inconsistent JKR was
by naming the slytherins when he doesn't usually recognize anyone
outside his groups.

Carol:
Exactly. The Slytherins he knew best (Draco, Goyle, and the now-dead
Crabbe) certainly weren't there, and he would have recognized Pansy
Parkinson in the unlikely event that she returned, but most of the
rest would be part of the faceless mass of students and Hogsmeade
residents that Slughorn was leading in. He would know more recognize
individual Wizards in that group, aside from the few I've mentioned,
than he would recognize individual House-Elves. Too much was going on,
and his attention was elsewhere, even if he were better at recognizing
people than he has shown himself to be in these books.

Carol, who sees no reason to doubt Phineas Nigellus's claim that
"Slytherin played its part"--not only through Slughorn and the
now-dead Snape and the inspiration of the long-dead Regulus, but
through the students themselves following Slughorn, their new HoH,
into battle