CHAPTER DISCUSSION: Prisoner of Azkaban Chapter 2: Aunt Marge's Big Mistake

[Mike]

No: HPFGUIDX 189406

> > http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/189396
> > Megan's Question:
> 3. Back to Aunt Marge - would you have been able to control  
> yourself as long as Harry did? How about when you were his age?

Mike:
In answer to your question, yes and no. (how's that for taking a position <g>) I think I would have been able to control myself in one of those predicaments for a little while. But after 4 or 5 days of it, pfft, forget it. I'd have lashed out a whole lot worse than Harry did.

Ya know how right after Harry baloonifies Marge, he heads out to the hall to collect his trunk and pulls out his wand. I was really hoping it was to go back and shoot a dart into Marge and watch her fly off in a swirling pattern like a baloon letting out its air.


> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/189399
> > 4. Do you think that students from wizarding families are
> > watched as closely by the ministry to see if they perform
> > magic during the summer? Why or why not?

> dzturtleshell:

> Makes me wonder why no one noticed when Tom Riddle murdered his
> father and grandparents in the Muggle village in which they lived
> when he was 16. I thought there weren't supposed to be any other
> wizards there either?

Mike:
First, to respond to the part I snipped: JKR kind of released the whole monitoring situation in dribs and drabs. In CoS we first learn about detecting underage magic. In OotP we learn that the situation at Privet Drive has been watched more closely than others. In HBP, Dumbledore reveals that the Ministry can only detect magic performed in the vicinity of underage wizards, but they can't pinpoint who did it. Finally, in DH, we learn about "the Trace", which is evidently the spell or vehicle by which the Ministry monitors underage wizards. Phew, makes you think JKR hadn't exactly thought this detail all the way through from the beginning, doesn't it?

So, on to Riddle and his murdering his kin. Simple really, there were wizards in that vicinity, and one who had specifically attacked the elder Tom Riddle in the past - Morfin, Tom's uncle. Since Tom framed his uncle, Morfin becomes the perfectly logical culprit to the Ministry, despite their distinct lack of logical thinking. Then again, Morfin's wand had been found to have done the deed, and Morfin proudly proclaimed his guilt. I'm not sure I would have been so wise as to ask the question of "why?". The fact that the trace must have been set off and yet there was no underage wizard around when they arrived, must not have concerned them. The Minisrty is one of those *don't bother me with the facts* agencies.


> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/189398
> Pippin:
> There is a lot of talk in this chapter about people getting what
> they deserve. Do people get what they deserve in the Potterverse?

Mike:
Some do, the Malfoys come to mind. Certainly Bella got what she deserved. Peter did, eventually. I think the Carrows got off easy. Umbridge deserved much worse than what she got, unless of course the Centaurs did some unspeakable deeds to which we were not privy. <eg>

> Pippin:
> Or is that a myth which the characters use to explain away the
> arbitrary inequalities in their lives?

Mike:
People have to believe there is some kind of karmic justice in their world else there would be nothing to look forward to and nothing to restrain those nastier impulses. But the Potterverse is rife with those inequalities that never get corrected. Personally, I harbor the fantasy that the Weasley's got the Malfoy Mansion as their spoils of war and the Malfoys were made to go live at the Burrow.



> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/189405
> AmanitaMuscaria: Why do you think JKR mirrored the scene of
> Snape having his trouser-leg in tatters and bloody from Fluffy
> in Philosophers Stone with Vernon rushing after Harry after he'd
> blown Marge up?

Mike:
I had never thought of this parallel before. I suppose we should have noticed the disparity between the Vernon and Severus while she was drawing the parallel. Snape was acting selflessly trying to protect the Stone, and he sought nothing from Harry. Dursley was oblivious to his and his sister's maltreatment of Harry, and went blustering after Harry to fix his sister's predicament. Yet both of them were reluctant protectors of Harry, and both because they loved an Evans woman.

So, AM, did I get it? <g>

~Mike