CHAPTER DISCUSSION: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban Chapter 12: The Pat

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 189954


> Potioncat:
> Good point. That reminds me of a scifi story in which people are able to send a copy of themselves into dangerous situations. They go into a booth for a moment and step out. Only at the same time the copy steps out and is shocked to find himself on Mars or wherever. The copy believes himself to be the original version.
> 
> What do you think the portraits think of themselves? To me they are interactive portraits of headmasters, but do they think they are real?  Honestly, Nick and Myrtle and the other ghosts seem very real to me--not just imprints at all.
> 

Pippin:

Maybe the problem is the way we are using the word "real" .  The body Myrtle had as a living girl  remained to be discovered in the bathroom, yet her ghost occupies a body which is the silvery image of it as it was when she died, spots, glasses and all, as real as anything else in the WW.  It could be the same with the soul. The soul that Myrtle had as a living girl went on, but at the same time left its imprint on the magical world as a ghost. 

It's interesting to think that the ghost preserves things that the original soul might be glad to leave behind. I doubt that Nick's departed soul cares that he wasn't properly decapitated --and that body must have fallen to dust, head and all, a long time ago.

JKR said somewhere that the headmaster portraits are kind of special, and most portraits don't do more than utter catchphrases. I tend to think the castle portraits are part of the magic of the castle, and most wizards aren't aware of how capable they are. I don't think Fudge and Scrimgeour  know that the headmaster portraits at the Ministry and St Mungo's can spy on them. 

Pippin