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Yes, there are seven books.
Wow maybe I should get in the book writing business
You’d have to work on your grammar and vocabulary a lot before embarking on a writing career. 😉
Yes, I know that you’re kidding. No need to point it out.
Why?
The book will be called modern orthodox in bp and there relationship with me spoiler alert the answer is not good 😉
Ok, I’m gonna stop hijacking every thread on the cr to respond to your outrageous posts.
I hope you get the help you need asap.
@lekaitin girl ur to serious it’s not an Aveireh to joke around a little
Phew, somebody blocked him? He was starting to get on my nerves…
What were Harry and Ron thinking when they decided to fly the car to school? Obviously if the train already left, Mr. and Mrs. Weasely would be imminently coming back and would figure something out. Did Ron and Harry really think that the Weasely’s would be stuck behind the barrier? Worst comes to worse they could have apparated out. (While Harry might not yet have known about apparition, Ron certainly did.)
They were simply misbehaving.
What happens when a muggle is bitten by a werewolf?
Do they become a werewolf? Why have I never heard of one? So do they not become one? Is it worse if you are a wizard than a muggle?
They do become werewolves.Sometimes they just seem (to muggles) to mysteriously disappear. The Ministry of Magic deals with that kind of stuff.
Werewolves don’t bite them because theydon’t like the muggle taste.
popa- I actually looked up your question because I got curious what J.K.R. says to that. Muggles can become werewolves, and the ministry captures them and keeps them under control. It is also possible to die from werewolf venom, so many muggles that get bitten do not survive.
I’m not quite satisfied with JKR’s read on that. I don’t see any reason why the ministry would care about muggle werewolves. There of plenty of other dangerous muggle things the ministry doesn’t care about. And if muggles are werewolves, then there is nothing specially magical about it.
Can you imagine what would happen if a muggle got bitten? Not only did they not believe in the supernatural before, they now transform every month into a monster and have no idea how to control it. It’s in the ministry’s best interests to keep muggle werewolves under control and away from normal muggles.
Pops, i sent JKR a email with your concerns and have been promised a reply within 3 centuries.
You should email her this whole thread.
Can you imagine what would happen if a muggle got bitten? Not only did they not believe in the supernatural before, they now transform every month into a monster and have no idea how to control it. It’s in the ministry’s best interests to keep muggle werewolves under control and away from normal muggles.
That’s a bit circular though. See, if the ministry didn’t do that, then werewolves would not be considered supernatural at all–no more than trees growing are supernatural.
Magical governments hide all magical creatures from muggles. It doesn’t matter if they’re creatures that are partly human.
Yes, but what makes a creature magical?
Humans can be magical, if they are able to do magic. Creatures don’t do magic though–they each just have their own idiosyncrasies. Cows are also weird–they have 4 stomachs. Venus fly traps are a plant that eats bugs. Bats have sonar. Mosquitoes eat blood. Dogs can smell something huge distances away.
I think we can define magic as something that breaks the rules of physics and the world in a way that doesn’t simply redefine physics. Meaning, gravity doesn’t break the rule of physics requiring items not in motion to stay not in motion unless acted on by a force–it redefines by adding another rule that gravity is a force.
Bats don’t break the rules–they add a rule that some creatures can have sonar. Transfiguration breaks the rules of science. Werewolves are simply a new communicable disease.
Why would the ministry care if muggles knew there were werewolves? Why is it different from muggles knowing about ebola?
If muggles knew about werewolves, they’d panic. And they couldn’t do anything about it anyway.
And the International Statute of Secrecy cannot be broken.
They wouldn’t panic if they had always known about werewolves. The same way they don’t panic about real wolves (which also attack people sometimes).
And it shouldn’t be governed by the International Statute of Secrecy since that is only about magic.
it’s about magic and magical creatures, including werewolves, centaurs, unicorns, merfolk, golden snidgets, et cetera.
Right. But what makes a werewolf a magical creature? The fact that you’ve never heard of it? You’ve only never heard of it because they keep it secret. But if they didn’t, you’d have heard of it and wouldn’t consider it anymore magical than the ebola virus.
Sorry just catching up on the last few pages of this post… heehee love you Harry Potter people.
McGonagall is a widow. She WAS married.To a MAN. For those of you who are too busy (read: have a life that doesn’t center around Harry Potter) and don’t have time to keep up with Pottermore, Harry Potter wikia updates character’s profiles with JK Rowling’s new information.
I doubt the Verplanck wikia will be updating…
So apparently, Anthony Goldstein is Jewish. And in a mixed school.
I caught that as well. Although it does raise the issue of why a mixed school (If Goldstein could be Jewish, then the Patil twin are probably Hindu) would celebrate Nittel Nacht (let’s keep this topical) so extravagantly. And that’s besides the fact it’s unlikely any wizarding folk are in any way religious.
Do you suppose Nosson Goldstein (as he should now be known, unless you have a better match) lit a menorah in the Ravenclaw common room, next to the statue of Rowena Ravenclaw?
Why is it that people think that Gryffindor is the best? It’s definitely subtly implied in the books. But when you think about it:
Gryffindor = bravery
Slytherin = cunning/ambition
Ravenclaw = intelligent
Hufflepuff = hard work
I think Gryffindor’s characteristic is the least important. Why would anyone want to be in Gryffindor?
All of them are equally important. But why everyone wants to be in Gryffindor is obvious: the Chosen one is a Gryffindor.
Obvious? Hogwarts traditions didn’t begin with Harry Potter. Personally, I see Ravenclaw as a good choice.
But that doesn’t really answer your question. The fact is, Gryffindor is considered not just brave, but noble, as in ‘hero’ material, and being there does not mean you are not intelligent or ambitious, just that your nature is courageous as well as your other traits, e.g. Hermione, who chose Gryffindor.
And furthermore, it is worth remembering that the three characters in whose company we spend the most time are Gryffindors, who would obviously be happiest with the House they were deemed most suitable for. I’m sure the Slytherins and Ravenclaws are equally proud of their House.
The real question is the rather unusual decision of the school to put all the, shall we say, less intelligent students, deemed to be neither smart, ambitious or brave, into one House. It’s not exactly a confidence booster for a quivering eleven year old to be told, by an ancient magical object imbued with mind reading powers by four of the most powerful wizards of all time, which looks into your deepest soul and destiny, that they are neither noble, clever or cunning, and are basically just a bit thick. As the Sorting Hat sings, just prior to the first sorting, they are ‘the rest’.
NE: As far as the holiday festivities, the Brits here can correct me if I’m wrong but to the best of my knowledge the whole holiday season seems to be a bigger deal in the UK than in, say, the US. I know I have a (pretty yeshivish) British friend here in sem who was saying yesterday how she misses Christmas. We were a bit, um, okay, and she told us that the festivity is a lot more pervasive and it doesn’t feel so religious. Whether that’s a good thing or not is entirely a different question (Chanukah here in Yerushalayim was phenomenal, if anyone’s interested) but in Harry Potter, Christmastime really does just seem to be a fun couple of days without a trace of religion.
After all, another friend of mine who went to public school talked about having Santa come in elementary school and people just thought it was cute, not overtly religious. She just didn’t go to school those days. It’s probably the kind of thing you can contest but not if you want to have a normal time in that school district through twelfth grade.
NeutiquamErro:
The “subtle implications” I was referring to, were not based on the threee main characters perspective. Gryffindor is made to seem like the best house. It’s always mentioned first. Many awesome wizards/witches were in it. Their crest is a lion.
Speaking of “hero material”, I would be more likely to describe it as hotheaded impetuousness. Especially Harry. There were many occasions where he played the hero. Did he have a plan in any of them? No. If not for the fact that he somehow always gets lucky, he and his friends would have been dead many times over. The need to be a hero is not a good trait, I think.
Speaking of Harry’s luck, I find it fascinating that throughout the series, Harry almost never accomplishes anything with his own skill/hard work. Things are always done for him or he gets incredibly lucky.
Book 1: The only notable thing he did was catch the key, which somehow he was born as the greatest flyer ever.
Book 2: He didn’t do anything remarkable. A sword came out of the hat just at the right moment, and a phoenix happened to heal him when he ahould have died.
Book 3: In one of the few times that Harry worked hard to accomplish something, he mastered the Patronus charm, which is pretty commendable. That was about the only notable thing in this book (other than somehow defying all rules of existence and logic with a time turner – see earlier in this thread for my still unanswered kashya on that.)
Book 4: This book is probably the prime example. Harry literally had everything done for him. Someone else put his name in the cup. Someone told him what the first task was. Someone basically told him what to do in the first task. (Maybe he should get credit for learning the summoning charm, except for the fact that had he been an even half decent student, he would have already known it.) Someone basically told him what the second task was. Someone told him what to do in the second task, and gave him the necessary supplies. Someone was eliminating obstacles for him in the third task, and even eliminating contestants as well. Then Voldemort could have killed him on the spot, but of course he had to toy with his victim first, and gave him back his wand.* Then Harry offers the feeble attempt of a disarming charm and gets lucky that his wand connects with Voldemort’s. Then the echoes of his parents tell him exactly what to do. In sum, he literally did nothing on his own in this book.
Book 5: He foolishly puts all his friends in danger, which actually leads to Sirius getting killed. Then precisely at the moment when Voldemort’s spell is about to kill him, Dumbledore swoops in and saves him.
Book 6: He earns a sterling reputation in potions by using someone else’s work. He again puts his friends in danger, though this time none of them died.
Book 7: He and his friends infiltrates the ministry with barely a plan, though luckily they escape. Someone basically gives him the sword.
He gets captured and Dobby rescues him. Someone lets slip that the cup is in Gringotts. Again, he leads an expedition with barely a plan, but luckily (thanks to a dragon) they escape. He sees in a vision that the diadem is in Hogwarts and he just happens to have stumbled across it the year before. Then Voldemort’s curse doesn’t kill him. Then he is able to beat Voldemort because he has the allegiance of Voldemort’s wand.
In sum: Harry is not anything special. He always has someone helping him, or is simply in the right place at the right time.
But at least he’s better than Ron, who in seven books, did all of two useful things.
* Why is it that every villain makes this same mistake?
NeutiquamErro:
Hufflepuff didn’t only take the rejects. They specifically chose those who were loyal/hard-working. They just also took the rejects. So it’s not quite as bad as you make it out to be. I would probably rather be in Hufflepuff than Gryffindor (except that Gryffindor has a better view), and I would certainly rather be in Ravenclaw. I also view Slytherin as better than Gryffindor, but in practice there might be good reasons to avoid going to Slytherin.
Slytherin is great, but Gryffindor is actually the right place for some people.
PAA:
But they took the rejects. It may not be as bad as I make it out to be, but I personally would be devastated to be sorted into Hufflepuff, due to the implications.
It is interesting when you consider Hogwarts’ view on a persons ability to change. Does the Hat look into somebody’s future, their state of mind, their preference, or their deepest character. I would assume the latter, but what if a person changes, and finds themselves in a House they are unhappy with? Does the Hat take this into account, and also look into some other aspects, such as those mentioned above?
And furthermore, pursuant to your observation regarding Harry’s luck, my instinct at this point is to simply say that that is what will happen in a children’s book, that the main characters will have a Tintin-like stroke of luck at moments of great peril, but, this being Harry Potter, such conjecture is unworthy.
So instead –
Firstly, you don’t give Harry enough credit. In almost every book he displays exceptional powers of deduction, as well as other traits such as being an accomplished wizard and possessing great bravery. In the first to discover the secrets of the Stone, battle through to the end, in the second to find the Chamber, and battle Voldermort alone, in the third to find out about Sirius, as well as rescuing him, in the fourth… well not much in the fourth, but he certainly displays initiative. In the fifth he is deliberately misled, but does sterling work with the DA, proving that he is a better wizard then one might have realised, when you see how far advanced he is ahead of his peers. In the sixth, his rescue of Dumbledore at the end was impressive, and in the seventh, he outsmarts one of the cleverest wizards ever, and that was almost completely without help. So to sum up, he does display many talents through the book, even if he does get a lot of help. And that was even if you ignore Hermione’s help.
Secondly, many of these strokes of luck are deliberate design, by other, greater wizards. There is strong evidence, and often explicit proof, that Dumbledore was aware of many of Harry’s challenges, but chose to let him face them apparently alone, but help him in indirect ways. For example, Fawkes in the second book. Add to that Voldermort and Crouch manipulating him, and much of luck is proven to be anything but.
And there is more to be said on a more general point of JK deliberately not writing Harry as a genius, but that can come later. And I join yekke2 in urging you to read Harry Potter and the Method of Rationality, which does exactly that.
And regarding the habit of villains in HP always giving him back his wand, the root of that lies in wizarding tradition. Dark wizards consider themselves supreme, an unhealthy mixture of hubris and pride. Being racially or ideologically superior, they both genuinely believe they cannot lose to an inferior, and often see themselves as noble, and therefore must win in a fair fight. The duel is an ancient wizardng tradition, and even dark wizards accept that.
NeutiquamErro:
It may not be as bad as I make it out to be, but I personally would be devastated to be sorted into Hufflepuff, due to the implications.
But you can always assume that you got chosen for being hard working and not because you are a reject.
Regarding luck, I was just using it as a generic term for things accomplished not through his own skill/work. My point includes the fact there were greater wizards orchestrating events.
Also, he didn’t “outsmart” Voldemort. He simply had access to information which Voldemort didn’t have access to. And anyway, I still hold that his “outsmartingness” shouldn’t actually have worked (see my next post).
And when I mentioned all villains making the same mistake, I wasn’t referring to Harry Potter; I was referring to all stories.
Since this came up in my previous post:
I raised this point back on page 2, namely that Harry had won Malfoy’s wand, not the Elder Wand. People responded to me that as long as you gain the allegiance of one wand, you automatically gain the allegiance of all wands of that person. When I questioned why that should be, sirvoddmort said “she makes the rules”. But actually, saying that JK Rowling makes the rules doesn’t even address the issue. Because Harry based his plan on the knowledge that he gleaned from Ollivander.
Let’s see what Ollivander told him:
matters. Much also depends upon the wand itself. In general,
And:
out of his pocket and handing it to Ollivander.
Brittle. I was forced to make this shortly after my kidnapping, for
Peter Pettigrew. Yes, if you won it, it is more likely to do your
Ollivander swallowed.
And:
I do not know. Its history is bloody, but that may be simply due
to the fact that it is such a desirable object, and arouses such
passions in wizards.
So we see that all Ollivander told Harry was that winning a wand will grant you its allegiance. He does not say anything about other wands owned by the same person. So who told Harry to make such an extrapolation, especially considering that there is no compelling reason why it should be true first place? At the very least, he should have asked Ollivander about this specific point if he was staking the entire future on it. And Ollivander specifically said that he did not know if this rule applied to the Elder Wand.
So Harry’s “outsmartingness” was actually complete foolishness based on an illogical extrapolation of a principle, and an application of the illogical extrapolation to a situation where the world’s expert was explicitly unsure as to whether the principle itself even applied.
Saying “she makes the rules” does not address this.
PAA:
But you can always assume that you got chosen for being hard working and not because you are a reject.
Or I might not.
Also, he didn’t “outsmart” Voldemort. He simply had access to information which Voldemort didn’t have access to.
Voldermort should have figured it out for himself. He was doubtless aware of Malfoy having disarmed Dumbledore, this information would not have been left out in Snape or Malfoy’s report (there may be a small chance this was not mentioned, but that is unlikely). He should then have enquired as to whether Draco had been defeated since, and not assumed. And he didn’t, either because he was too proud or too careless.
And when I mentioned all villains making the same mistake, I wasn’t referring to Harry Potter; I was referring to all stories.
Are you insinuating that Harry Potter is nothing more than a story? Blasphemy!
Anyway, all good points as far as Harry’s luck is concerned, but you seemed to say his success was incidental and not by design or skill. The correct response to this was, that many of his achievements could not have been reached without Harry’s skill and courage, and most of the rest could be put down to design, with greater wizards orchestrating the sequence of events. So luck plays a very small part in the whole episode.
Anyway, all good points as far as Harry’s luck is concerned, but you seemed to say his success was incidental and not by design or skill.
I agree that much of it was by design. My point is simply that it was not through Harry’s skill or hard work. Which I guess explains why he was put in Gryffindor – Ravenclaw and Slytherin are for those with skill, Hufflepuff is for those who work hard, and Gryffindor is for those who engage in activities without the requisite skill/work (and perhaps have guardian angels protecting them), and to make it sound good they call it “bravery”.
Ok, I think I might have let out too much of my cynical side. I do acknowledge that Harry’s courage definitely contributed to his success. But he was catapulted to success/fame on the skill/work of others who are rarely given credit.
PAA:
OK, I see where you’re coming from, although I won’t begrudge Harry his enormous success.
But I have one observation that overrides my other current pressing concerns about Harry’s life.
All the way through the books, we are informed of the genius of Harry’s parents. I could bring you numerous quotes, but I can’t really be bothered right now. But prominent examples are when ProfMac says that James aced his OWLS with no very little effort, not at all like Harry, who managed just one ‘Outstanding’, and when Slughorn repeatedly tells Harry about his mother’s intelligence.
So my question is this. How come Harry, who incidentally also shares minds with one of the cleverest wizards ever, and has two incredibly clever parents, isn’t particularly bright. He’s got some good points, granted, but generally struggles with his schoolwork. For a boy descended from famously clever wizards in the Peverells, have genetics skipped a generation.
Possible answers to this might be that Harry had a lot to deal with apart from his school work. But that wouldn’t fully explain Harry’s lack of genius.
His parents weren’t geniuses either. James didn’t even have his wand when Voldemort killed him. He should have kept it with him at all times.
Really? Sorry, but please leave it to the professionals.
James was, according to multiple sources, extremely clever. What you’ve pointed out is completely irrelevant. He didn’t know the Fidelius charm had been broken, and it wouldn’t have helped if he had had it on him.
That insult was entirely uncalled for. So far you have insulted many people. You don’t have to be so mean when you disagree with someone.
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