CHAPDISC: PS/SS 1, The Boy Who Lived

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 187686

Alla:
> > Dumbledore left Harry with a note instead of actually talking to the Dursleys because he is control freak and manipulator. I can't believe that he would not even entertain a possibility that oh, I don't know, maybe just maybe Dursleys will refuse to take Harry in.
> 
> Pippin:
> How would it make Dumbledore  any less a control freak and a manipulator if he spoke to the Dursleys in person? He certainly pushes them around in HBP. But JKR wants to keep the blood protection a secret from the reader while revealing it to Petunia, and  Dumbledore does not want McGonagall or Hagrid to know about it either. Any discussion might be overheard, as Dumbledore knows all too well. 

Alla:

I will concede I used the wrong words, I mean I do think that Dumbledore is a control freak and manipulator, but the answer to this question should have been that Dumbledore left Harry with a note because he is incredibly arrogant and is just absolutely sure that people will do as he says or thinks people should behave.


You are right, it does not make Dumbledore any less control freak and manipulator if he spoke to Dursleys in person, what it would have made him though  IMO is to put it simply - polite man, who must have known what a huge favor he must have asked of Dursleys, who eh "loved" Lily and her family oh so much and I would imagine were so delightfully "happy" to find a child on their doorsteps.

Again, do I think the fact that Dumbledore would have **have to** ask Dursleys even beg to take Harry in is horrifying? Yes, I do, however this is a set of facts Dumbledore has to deal with.

So anyway, enjoyed as I did Dumbledore putting Dursleys in his place in HBP, I have to say that he had some nerve...

As to JKR wanting to keep blood protection a secret? Eh I think it cold have been easily done by showing Dumbledore opening Dursleys' door and coming to talk to them. Who says readers just have to overhear that conversation before time for us comes to learn all the facts?


Pippin:
>  I'm not sure what you're getting at here, though. If the Dursleys wouldn't take Harry in of their own choice, then there'd be no magical protection, so Dumbledore had to give them the opportunity to refuse, like it or not.

Alla:

Of course! It is just I think that  by leaving Harry there instead of talking to them he gave them less opportunity to refuse.

Pippin:
As we know now, Petunia was perfectly capable of informing Dumbledore by Muggle post if she decided not to take Harry in.

Alla:

She was capable and she deemed it necessary are IMO are completely different things. I am just amazed at Dumbledore's easy dismissal of possibility that she would have done just that, not notifying him.


Pippin: 
> If the Dursleys dumped Harry in an orphanage or anywhere else, Dumbledore would be able to find him as easily as Hagrid found him in the hut on the rock.  Harry is evidently not unplottable. 
<SNIP>

Alla:

And if Petunia did not notify Dumbledore that she shipped Harry off to orphanage, he would have known that how?

Maybe letter would have found him eleven years later, if he would not have died or seriously hurt himself from another flare of instantaneous magic.

I mean, I wonder did Dumbledore ever think how lucky he is that Harry was not badly hurt after him appearing on the roof or other stunts like that?

After all it is not like anybody was, you know, checking on himj.

JMO,

Alla