OoP: Flints, errors, and other details (LONG)

[psychic_serpent]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, GulPlum <hp at p...> wrote:
> Perhaps Barb (or anyone else) could add any that I may have missed 
> or find alternative explanations for some I've included, in an 
> attempt at the beginnings of an OoP FAQ?  (Incidentally, I'm a bit 
> displeased because I spent a great amount of time last night on a 
> huge post of parallels between Harry and his "father figures" and 
> noticed that Barb beat me to it with a much better analysis than I 
> could have mustered, so I've scrapped that for the time being, 
> although I may yet return to it.). ;-)

Ooh, I'd like to see that.  Don't let me stop you. ;)

> 1. The Thestrals. JKR admitted in the Albert Hall on Thursday that 
> Harry should have seen them at the end of GoF, but preferred to 
> leave it until OoP. The explanation is a bit flimsy, but at least 
> she recognised the problem. :-)

I have the Thestrals on my list too, largely because her explanation 
sounds like she's thinking, "Oh, drat!  I should have made sure that 
Harry was distracted at the end of GoF so he didn't see the 
carriages, or I should have had him taken off to the train in some 
other fashion, to get around the Thestral issue..."  When all is 
said and done, I'm inclined to think now that this is actually 
another Flint for GoF, not OotP, as something should have happened 
differently at the end of the fourth book.  She seemed worried about 
having to go into a long-winded explanation of the Thestrals at the 
end of a long book already chock-full of information (GoF, that is) 
and I understand that, but what she could have done instead was to 
give a plausible reason for Harry to come nowhere near the carriages 
at the end of that book, which wouldn't introduce the Thestrals and 
wouldn't make that part of this book seem inconsistent.

> 2. Harry's repossession of the Marauder's Map. Although it would 
> have been nice for JKR to have dotted the 'i's and crossed 
> the 't's, a reasonable explanation is that Dumbledore retrieved it 
> from fake!Moody's possessions (it would've been difficult for him 
> not to have recognised it for what it was) and returned it to 
> Harry. Fake!Moody *had* called it "Potter's Map". Dumbledore may 
> also have asked Sirius or Lupin about it (the map *does* bear 
> MWPPs' names).

That's why I actually don't have this one on my list.  I think that 
it's consistent with Dumbledore's history with Harry to have given 
the map back, no questions asked.  We didn't see it, and it isn't 
even mentioned in passing (which might have been nice, you're 
right), but this didn't feel even slightly disruptive, as the 
Thestrals did, and didn't require an explanation that messes with 
earlier books.  It simply seems natural and consistent that he 
should get his property back.  

> 3. Back row of the Quidditch arena. On p. 602, we get: "They 
> [Harry & Hermione] found seats in the topmost row of the stands." 
> Five paragraphs on, we get: "Harry looked round and saw Hagrid's 
> enormous bearded face sticking between the seats. Apparently, he 
> had squeezed his way all along the row behind" (which was full of 
> first- and second-years). How can there be a row behind 
> the "topmost row", unless the Quidditch arena magically expands if 
> more people turn up?

Now this one I didn't see at all.  (Shows how observant I am!)  She 
does sometimes do things with the 'choreography' of the characters 
that defy logic, such as Ron simultaneously being on the floor and 
the bed in the Shrieking Shack scene of PoA, and I think that 
qualifies this as a legitimate Flint.  It is, however, not something 
that disrupts the story for me.  Good eye!

> 4. Dennis Creevey. On p. 301, he turns up at the Hog's Head with 
> Colin. Dennis was Sorted in GoF and thus is only a second-year and 
> not eligible for Hogsmeade weekends. Perhaps Colin persuaded 
> McGonagall that his kid brother would be safer in his company? (I 
> don't doubt that the brothers were able to hoodwink their - 
> Muggle - parents into signing a permission form for Dennis). On 
> the other hand, Umbridge is on the offensive by this stage, and as 
> High Inquisitor would have given herself the right to vet the list 
> of those allowed to leave the school.

I have this on my list, and this definitely smacks of a classic 
Flint, which is to say that, as with Marcus Flint, she seems to have 
forgotten what year Dennis Creevey is in (although she seems to have 
aged him up, instead of down, like with Flint).  I feel a Flintish 
explanation coming for this, too (I always thought it was slightly 
lame to say he had to do a year over--she could have retroactively 
changed his year to fifth in PS and sixth in CoS).  But again, I 
didn't feel distracted by this and just shrugged and moved on with 
the story.
 
> 5. How does Harry manage "Lumos" while not holding his wand? (p. 
> 21) As far as we know, like all spells and incantations, it only 
> works if the wizard is holding his wand at the time. Yet Harry 
> picks it up (indeed finds it) only once it's lit.
 
> I suspect that this is a subtle clue that Harry's on the road to 
> become very adept at wandless magic. Although Harry appears 
> unaware of the "shock" which prevents Vernon holding onto Harry 
> right at the beginning (p.  10), it is connected to the throbbing 
> pain in Harry's head from having banged it against the window. 
> This is significant*, and I predict that it will be very useful 
> during the Final Showdown.

I never thought of this as a Flint and still don't.  I actually 
think it's perfectly consistent with the way Harry has performed 
some quite amazing wandless magic (inflate-an-aunt, anyone?) when 
under duress.  While we haven't seen anyone light a wand without 
holding it, there's no reason to believe that someone powerful 
enough couldn't do it.  Good heavens, Remus Lupin can just conjure 
up fire in his hand for light at a moment's notice, without being 
burnt, to say nothing of the stuff Dumbledore can do.  I think we 
will see Harry perform more and more wandless magic, which probably 
will be very important, considering that he has a brother wand to 
Voldemort's that makes it difficult to duel properly with his 
nemesis.  I'd call this more a cross between a revelation and a bit 
of foreshadowing rather than a Flint.

> 6. How did James become Head Boy if he wasn't a Prefect? The 
> Pensieve reveals Lupin to have been the fifth-year prefect, but 
> Molly says on p. 149 that "it's the first step" to being Head Boy. 
> I don't believe this is a Flint at all, simply because James is 
> far too important and a big deal is made about it. Something (the 
> Prank?) is going to happen between OWLs and MWPPs' arrival for 
> their sixth year to make Dumbledore change his mind and give James 
> the job. Alternatively, Lupin will tell Dumbledore that he can't  
> control his friends and resign. (I'm assuming that James will have 
> to have become prefect material in the sixth year as there will 
> have to have been *some* foundation to name him Head Boy in the 
> seventh).
 
Now this I definitely thought of as a Flint, but not for the reasons 
you might think.  I think it might be perfectly possible, as you 
explained, for Lupin to have started off as the prefect in their 
house and year and, post-Prank, for Lupin to be stripped of the 
office and James promoted to prefect, which would later put him in 
the running for Head Boy.  However, there are still two Flintish 
thing about this, for me.  

First, Remus Lupin never says anything about not being the prefect 
for his last three years of school.  He simply indicates that 
Dumbledore thought he was the most responsible without ever 
qualifying that statement with something about the headmaster 
changing his mind after the prank (or perhaps some other event).  
Nothing about how James later showed himself to be responsible 
enough for the Head Boy position.  Not a word.  It seems that if 
you're going to be sort-of dissing someone's father (by implying 
that he was irresponsible) you might want to qualify that if it 
wasn't always true, especially if you counted that person as a 
friend and he's now dead. (Lupin doesn't otherwise seem inclined to 
speak ill of the dead.)  

Second, Harry doesn't call him on this either, which he always does 
whenever anyone else says anything even remotely insulting about his 
dad.  It's not the idea of Lupin being the prefect and James being 
the Head Boy that I find Flintish so much as the lack of commentary 
about it.  This strongly implies that she just plain forgot that she 
made James Head Boy.  If she didn't, she should have had either 
Remus or Harry say something about it.  This Flint I DID find 
disruptive, and incredibly annoying, although so much else was 
happening that I had to sigh and move on.

> 7. OWL results. JKR can't seem to make up her mind when they're 
> announced. Percy sits his OWLs in PS/SS, but he gets the results 
> in CoS (p.40), the day before Harry arrives at the Burrow, i.e. 
> 3rd August (the Anglia arrives during the night following the 
> third day after Dobby's visit, on the evening of Harry's birthday, 
> so Harry must arrive at the Burrow on the morning of the 4th). 
> Gred & Forge sit theirs in PoA but receive their grades at the 
> same time as the rest of the school get their end-of-year exam 
> results, as does Percy his "top-grade NEWTs" (p. 313), and they 
> don't need to wait for the holidays/beginning of GoF. Yet in Oop, 
> McGonagall tells our heroes that an "'An owl will be sent to you 
> some time in July'" (p. 625).  So which is it? Late June, July, or 
> early August?
  
I didn't think of this as a Flint because there's so much going on 
both at the Ministry and at Hogwarts right now, as they recover from 
the Umbridge regime, that the results not coming until July seemed 
perfectly logical to me.  The Quidditch finals, when we've had them, 
weren't consistently timed either.  When it comes to things like 
this, I think I've learned that there's such a thing in the books 
as "JKR time," and it follows rules that time in the rest of the 
universe does not. (Her time is not like our earth-time, to 
paraphrase from Buffy. <g>)

> 8. Rookwood's first name. In the GoF Pensieve scene, Crouch refers 
> to him as "Augustus", whereas the Daily Prophet refers to him in 
> OoP (p. 480) as "Algernon". The thing is, neither of these sources 
> have been proved to be exact with their names.   

JKR may have made a mistake there, but she could probably cover it 
up by saying it's the Prophet's mistake.  We'll have to see whether 
future editions change the "Algernon" to "Augustus" in the same way 
that "Seeker" was changed to "Keeper" in the Quidditch final of PoA 
(since the Seeker doesn't guard the Slytherin goals).  She may have 
had Neville's Uncle Algie on the brain, as there's a little more 
about the Longbottoms in this book, and I agree that the most likely 
full name for which Algie is probably a nickname is "Algernon."  
With Uncle Algie on her mind, the name "Algernon" may have 
unintentionally crept into a place where "Augustus" should have 
been.  I didn't have this on my list, though.

> 9. Harry in Snape's Pensieve memory. If the Pensieve is an 
> accurate record of Snape's *memories* (rather than a "flashback 
> film"), Harry should not be able to have concentrated on following 
> MWPP around, but should have retained Snape's perspective.  

It seems to me that the Pensieve was to be a device for her to show 
Harry his dad and his contemporaries, and she didn't think through 
all of the ramifications of this.  She shouldn't have had Harry see 
so many things that Snape wouldn't have, IMO.  And while it's true 
that in GoF, Harry looks behind Dumbledore's back to see Moody's 
expression, and you can argue that Dumbledore couldn't have seen 
what the expression was on Moody's face during the trial, I 
personally am of the growing opinion that Dumbledore DID see Moody's 
expression, because certainly, having eyes in the back of your head 
would be a very good attribute for a headmaster.  The Pensieve in 
this book just didn't seem consistent with the Pensieve in GoF.  It 
felt very Flinty to me and rather bothersome.

> Also, did the Prank predate the OWLs, or not?  can't remember all 
> the details, but I have the impression somewhere in the depths of 
> my brain (I can't find the reference in canon) that the Prank 
> happened during the sixth year, thus after the OWLs exams. But in 
> the conversation, MWPP appear quite open about it and don't appear 
> to care if anyone's listening. Even more curious...

It all depends on when Sirius' birthday is, doesn't it?  He was said 
to be sixteen when he tried to kill Snape.  And we must remember 
that it was in their fifth year that they perfected the Animagus 
Transfiguration in their fifth year.  

> 10. At the beginning of the week, I admitted that I dislike the 
> whole idea of the Prophecy, the orbs and the way they're used. 
> Several details appear to make no sense or they're proof of such 
> incredible stupidity on Dumbledore's and Voldemort's parts that 
> they don't deserve the positions they enjoy. I shall limit this 
> to "Flint-like" ones, which I shall make no effort to explain, 
> because I can't find a way around them.
 
I didn't put anything concerning the Prophecy on my own Flint list 
as it seemed to be an area where she was making up her own rules 
left and right.  I admit that the prophecies being 'stored' at the 
Ministry was rather annoying to me; it seemed monumentally 
unnecessary, except as a means to get a bunch of people into the 
Ministry along with Harry so he could see the Black Veil, which 
simply screams I WILL BE VERY IMPORTANT AT THE END OF THE SEVENTH 
BOOK.  It felt very manipulative.  

I don't mind there BEING a prophecy--I'd be surprised if there 
wasn't, actually, as Voldemort would have needed SOME excuse for why 
he would target a little baby.  The existence of the prophecy makes 
sense; its storage at the Ministry does not.  I wish she'd found a 
better way to do this.  To me the things connected with the Prophecy 
were less Flint-like and more needed-to-get-a-better-idea.  That you 
found several inconsistencies in the way she treated the Prophecy 
(Neville being able to handle it) just proves, I think, that she 
should have thought this through a bit longer.  How the Prophecy 
constitutes a weapon in and of itself is beyond me; the 
real 'weapon' for Voldemort, IMO, was his ability to make Harry 
believe that Sirius was in danger when he was not, inducing Harry to 
run off to try to save him.  And this is a weapon he already has at 
his disposal, until Harry finally gets serious about his Occlumency 
lessons.  Which brings us to--

> Dumbledore claims that he kept his distance from Harry, so that 
> Voldemort might not suspect that his and Harry's relationship was 
> a little closer than headmaster-pupil.  [snip] Come on, Voldemort 
> and Lucius have to be fools to think there was nothing special 
> between Dumbledore and Harry, and Dumbledore is a fool for 
> thinking they might fall for it.

You make excellent points, and the only think I can think of is that 
Dumbledore is fumbling for a reason here and is not being completely 
honest with Harry.  Something about his explanation sounds hollow, 
which I'm finding annoying, as I'd hoped Dumbledore would stop 
keeping secrets from Harry.  I think his telling Harry "everything" 
could very well have been his way of temporarily pacifying him while 
still keeping back some bits of significant information.  Time will 
tell.

--Barb, still terribly impressed with JKR's bravery for many of the 
things she included in OotP