Petunia / Hermione and the Horcrux / Smeltings stick / Anniversary - Congra

[Catlady (Rita Prince]

No: HPFGUIDX 187834

Geoff wrote in <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/187779>:

<< If, as you suggest, Petunia justifies her treatment by thinking that Harry's presence is a threat to the family, how does abusing him, starving him, neglecting him and demeaning him make him any less of a threat? >>

As Zfshiruba mentioned in <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/187789>, people are not logical. However, her excuse for why Harry being a danger to her family causes her to abuse him is that what is a danger to her family is his magic ability and the abuse is attempting to beat the magic out of him. "Didn't we swear when we took him in we'd stamp out that dangerous nonsense?" as Zgirnius quotes Vernon in her chapter summary for PS/SS Chapter Three in <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/187792>.

Sandie spa76 asked in <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/187795>:

<< Are we supposed to think Hermione was so focused she just stabbed [the Horcrux] with a basilisk fang straightaway, before Riddle's soul could play any mindtricks on her? >>

My assumption was always that it did play mind tricks on her which forced her to struggle, and were witnessed by Ron, but Ron was discreet enough not to tell Harry about this exposure of Hermione's secret feelings. On a meta-level, this immediately seemed unfair that Ron knows about Hermione's exteriorized inner struggle but Hermione doesn't know about Ron's. I feel it makes him subtlely a little bit one-up in their relationship. Although, now that I mention it, perhaps Rowling did that intentionally to make the relationship a bit more equal.

My meta-meta-level assumption was equally immediate: as Hermione is Rowling's Mary Sue, Rowling was not about to show her inner struggle to the reading the public. {That Rowling could write books that came out this readable and memorable dislike containing Mary Sue shows how well she writes.} 

Pippin wrote in <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/187810>:

<< The "knobbly sticks, used for hitting each other when the teachers weren't looking" as "good training for later life" now remind me of Hogwarts students and their wands. >>

The "good training for later life" reminded me of something I read, something autobiographical by C.S. Lewis about his pubic school, which advertised that the public school experience taught its students how to get on in "public life", and Lewis was sarcastic about how true that was, as the public school experience taught its students how to suck up to the powerful (popular students) and bully the weak (unpopular students), that the concubines (catamites) of the powerful are powerful themselves because of their influence on their partners, and a few other cynicisms.

The List Elves wrote in <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/187815>:

<< Favourite post of anyone else's to the group? >>

This mlist has been tremendously full of great posts, but I think the best must have been from Elkins. Maybe one examining legacies. Maybe the one exposing Barty Sr's total hypocrisy...

I wish I could find one post that I vaguely remember from the hub-bub around DH and the arguments about Rowling's anti-Slytherin bias; it was a post which said that Harry admiring Snape for his immense courage was still anti-Slytherin because it judged Snape only according to Gryffindor standards, not according to what Snape himself had valued. I found a similar post <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/177498> by Lealess saying << To address this one point, bravery is one aspect of Snape's personality. It happens to be one we know Harry values. What else does Harry see about Snape that may be important to Snape but isn't important to Harry? What about his work, the destroyed potions book, the knowledge that went with him? What about the positions he held, the skills he showed in doing his jobs? Are these things recognized or praised? No... his courage, the Gryffindor trait, is praised. Do you think Harry really understands Snape, or understands what he wants to see?>> but the post of which I'm thinking was written in the first person, like "I want to be admired for my whatever, not for an unimportant thing like my courage".