chapter discussions, SS/PS, chapter 5, Diagon Alley

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 187931


Pippin:

Do you think the author agrees with Draco that Hagrid is a kind of savage who
gets drunk every so often? It turns out to be true, but it's not the whole
story. The Prince's Tale comes late in Book Seven, but it's not the whole story
either. There are still significant developments to come.

Alla:

Well, Draco is not self proclaimed character who often speaks for the author, right? Therefore I think it is a bit easier to argue both sides whether author agrees with his contentions or not.

I am actually curious, what  positive developments were coming  for Slytherin house after Prince tale, because I do not remember any. Snape did his job and dead. Slughorn is already there. We already know about Regulus' story.

You know what they say to inexperienced trial lawyers? Make sure the last sentence in your closing argument is memorable, because this is what jury will remember. While Dumbledore's wondering is not exactly the very last one, but it feels like it to me. It feels to me that story of Snape is a story of overcoming his Slytherinness (is that even a word?) and Dumbledore nodding approvingly along the way

Pippin:
Dumbledore is not the hero. Harry is the hero, and he is the one who says that
it makes no difference to him if his son is a Slytherin. Do you think the author
agrees with that?

Alla:

I think so, yes. I also remember Harry talking about  Hat putting Al where he truly wants to be and do I have any doubt that he truly wants to be in Gryffindor? No, not really.

To be clear, I am not disputing that we are shown marginal change in the Slytherin house, to be sure I am not disputing that we are shown that they are not all devils, and some of them are heroes. All that I was arguing goes back to Sherry's original question about Harry developing antislytherin feelings. While I think Harry's feelings are shown to be over generalized, I do not think they were shown to be wrong as to the house as a whole.

Harry loves his son, of course he will support him even if he is in Slytherin house, but it looked to me that Harry is pretty sure that he will not be. IMO of course.


Pippin:
<SNIP>
It was clearly Slughorn who obtained the reinforcements and led them back to the
castle, to a battle that seemed far from winnable, considering that the castle
defenders were outnumbered and Voldemort had just announced Harry was dead. I
ask, as I did with Draco, what you think a decent person would have done in this
situation that Slughorn did not do?

Alla:

Well, in case of Slughorn my answer is nothing of course, it is just not enough for me to think that this is what the majority of Slytherins would have done. In the case of Draco, I thought I answered, for me to call Draco half decent person, I needed at least for him to not hesitate when he was told to identify the Trio. This was the action that required some sort of change from him, some miniscule reevaluation of his values and all that. Saving his friend? Eh, again, it is good, but to me did not require any change in Draco. I mean, I could not stand any one of those three, but surely nobody doubted that they are supposed to be friends?

It is when character does something which is something I would never believe he would have done before THAT to me shows a change in him. I am not disputing miniscule change in Draco, but way not enough for me to qualify it as any sort of reversal. Maybe in twenty or thirty years, he will even do something truly remarkable LOL. Maybe after Tower I just expected something a little bit faster, I don't know.

JMO,

Alla