The Harry Potter Reread is thinking about buying a humidifier, but it’s worried that the dog might try to eat it. Also, it’s not sure if a hot or cold one is better.
We’re going to spend some time in an orphanage and maybe cheat at sports! It’s chapters 13 and 14 of The Half-Blood Prince: The Secret Riddle and Felix Felicis.
Index to the reread can be located here! Other Harry Potter and Potter-related pieces can be found under their appropriate tag. And of course, since we know this is a reread, all posts might contain spoilers for the entire series. If you haven’t read all the Potter books, be warned.
Chapter 13—The Secret Riddle
Summary
News spreads in the school about Katie’s incident as she’s moved to St. Mungo’s for treatment. Harry goes to Dumbledore’s office for his next lesson and asks after her; Dumbledore informs him that she’s not doing well, but that she was quite lucky that the necklace only touched her through a small whole in her glove, preventing instant death. Professor Snape treated her to prevent the curse from spreading, and now she’s at the hospital. When Harry asks why Snape was allowed to treat her instead of Madam Pomfrey, Dumbledore tells him it’s because Snape knows far more about the Dark Arts. (Phineas’ portrait thinks Harry is impertinent for even asking such a question.) Harry tries to ask where Dumbledore was over the weekend, but he insists that he will tell Harry everything later on. They talk about the run-in with Mundungus—Albus promises Harry that he will not make off with anymore of Sirius’ family heirlooms—and then Harry asks if McGonagall told Dumbledore about his suspicions regarding Draco. Dumbledore promises to investigate every avenue dealing with Katie’s accident and starts their lesson.
He picks up Tom Riddle’s story where they left off, after Riddle Sr. left Merope in London, which Dumbledore knows due to evidence from Caractacus Burke (of Borgin and Burkes). Harry observes a Pensieve testament from Burke, who talks of Merope coming to the shop and trying to sell Slytherin’s locket. She was far along in her pregnancy, and had no idea how much the locket was worth. He gave her only ten Galleons for it. Dumbledore believes that Merope stopped using magic following Riddle’s departure, and would not attempt to save herself even at the end of her life. Harry is surprised by this, and Dumbledore asks if he’s feeling sorry for Voldemort, which Harry is quick to dismiss, asking if Merope had a choice to live. Dumbledore reminds Harry that though she had an infant to care for, she was weak from a life of suffering. They head into one of his memories, landing on a street where a much younger Albus is attracting stares due to his plum velvet suit.
The two follow younger Dumbledore into an orphanage, where Dumbledore asks to see the woman in charge, Mrs. Cole. They go to her office, and he proceeds to question her about Tom Riddle, offering him a place at Hogwarts. When Mrs. Cole is suspicious, Dumbledore casts a charm on her and begins plying her with gin (which she is very good at drinking). He asks about Tom’s family, and she tells him that Tom was born in the orphanage on New Year’s Eve, his mother dying an hour after the birth and telling them what she wanted the boy to be named. Tom has been there ever since. Mrs. Cole claims that he’s a funny child, was even from the start, but won’t continue until Dumbledore promises that he will be going to Hogwarts no matter what she reveals. When he does, she confides that he frightens the other kids in the orphanage, but they never have luck catching him when he bullies the kids. She mentions a boy who blamed Tom for the hanging of his rabbit after they fought. Two other children went into a cave with Tom during a countryside trip and came back changed. Dumbledore makes it clear that Tom would have to return to the orphanage every summer, and Mrs. Cole takes him to meet the boy.
Tom Riddle looks like a miniature version of his father. He’s supremely suspicious of Dumbledore, sure that he’s been brought in to take him away to an asylum, even as Dumbledore tries to explain Hogwarts to him. It’s not until he says the word “magic” that Tom gives pause. He asks if what he can do is magic, and Dumbledore asks what those things are. Tom tells him that he can make things move with his mind, that he can make animals do what he wants, that he can hurt people who annoy him. He tells Dumbledore that he always knew he was special, different from the rest. He commands Dumbledore to prove that he is magical as well, but Dumbledore insists that Tom refer to him politely, by “professor” or “sir” if he plans to attend Hogwarts. Tom’s demeanor changes, and he becomes instantly cordial. He asks again for a demonstration, and Dumbledore sets the wardrobe in Tom’s room on fire, then puts it out. Tom asks about getting a wand, but Dumbledore points out a rattling sound instead; something that wants out of his wardrobe. Tom looks scared, and fishes out a box that is shaking. Dumbledore asks if there is anything in the box that he should not have, and Tom answers in the affirmative.
There are a few items in the box that finally calm once it is open: a yo-yo, a thimble, a mouth organ. Dumbledore tells Tom that he must return them to their owners before leaving, and that he will know if Tom has not done so. He tells him that he cannot be a thief at school, and that he will not be able to use magic the way he has in the past once he begins his attendance. He tells Tom that the wizarding world has rules he must abide by. Tom’s face is unreadable during this explanation, but he agrees. Dumbledore tells him there is a fund available to students who require assistance, so he can get his robes and materials. He offers to accompany him, but Tom wants to go on his own, so Dumbledore gives him instructions on how to get to Diagon Alley, and hands him his supply list, train ticket, and acceptance letter. Before Dumbledore leaves, Tom tells him that he can talk to snakes and he wants to know if it’s a normal thing for a wizard to do. Dumbledore gives brief pause before telling him that it’s not common, but not unheard of either. Then Harry and present-day Dumbledore leave the memory.
Before they end their lesson, Dumbledore calls Harry’s attention to three important aspects of it: (1) Tom despised his own name for being common, hated anything that made him ordinary. (2) Tom was self-sufficient even as a child, kept his thoughts and feelings a secret, didn’t set much store by friends. (3) Tom collected trophies from the children he abused, reminders of nasty magic he used against them. Before leaving the office, Harry’s eyes go to the table where he had seen Marvolo’s ring last time, and he comments to Dumbledore that he had expected to see the mouth organ Tom stole on the table for this lesson. Dumbledore smiles and replies:
“Very astute, Harry, but the mouth organ was only ever a mouth organ.”
Commentary
At this point, we have to figure the Dumbledore has figured out exactly what’s going on with Draco, and just has to let the thing run its course. He still won’t tell Harry about his frequent sojourns outside the school, and I’m actually coming around to Albus’ way of thinking following this chapter. Explaining the ultimate quest is important, but if Harry becomes too goal-oriented, he’s going to turn deaf ear to the rest of the lessons and start pressing for a more active resolution. It’s relevant also that Albus takes time between these lessons, giving Harry a chance to fully absorb each vital piece before moving on. So again we come back to Merope Gaunt, who cuts herself off from magic once more due a different kind of abuse: abandonment. Dumbledore is quick to point out that while she did not attempt to keep going for the sake of her son, she was a victim who suffered her whole life, unlike Harry’s mother. It’s a scathing jab on Rowling’s part; in a series that is quick to celebrate motherhood in so many forms, a clear commentary can be drawn in regard to people and societies who would neglect a woman in Merope’s position, or even worse (in Burke’s case), take advantage of her.
I am going to break from this very serious commentary to give a moment for Dumbledore’s rocking plum velvet suit, of which I could find only one artistic rendering (from TomScribble on DeviantArt) that I love very much:
It seems unlikely that Albus couldn’t blend in with Muggles if he really cared to, which makes me wonder if the apparel choice isn’t down to Dumbledore wanting to wear something fabulous as a gay man. Just let me dream.
We get the measure of the orphanage where Tom grows up, and while it’s not a fun, bright place, it’s certainly not a Dickensian nightmare either—the people who work there seem to care for the children’s welfare, even if they are at their wits end about it. There’s no abundance, but no one is cold or hungry or ignored. All the same, this introduction to little Tom Riddle (and doesn’t that sound like a terrifying nursery rhyme) and his upbringing is chilling. Speaking as a person who has no degree in psychology, the armchair analysis still seems to point toward sociopathy. He has a developed narcissistic sense (believing that he’s special, better than others), an ability to instantly switch gears when his tactics don’t work (his abrupt shift to politeness when he realizes that Dumbledore won’t respond to anything less), has no want for companionship (he has no friends and frequently hurts the other children), and he’s expertly manipulative (currently through the use of magic, though it seems likely that he had other tactics before his power manifested).
Every time he uses his “magic interrogation voice” I’m put in mind of the Bene Gesserit of the Dune series, since they have a very similar power. This tactic was probably his first step on the road to Legilimancy; he began by asking for the truth, then moved on to taking it straight from the person’s mind. We can see the process Tom goes through, how calculated he is in this opening conversation: he’s starts off imperious, trying to throw his weight around. Once he realizes that his powers won’t work on Albus and the man won’t be bullied, he recalibrates and comes back polite and distant. Then, when Dumbledore has found out some of the more unsavory aspects of his person, he tries to make himself seem more singular by bringing up the Parseltongue ability.
A horribly creepy aside: what the hell did Tom do to those kids who went into the cave with him out in the countryside and came back “changed”? I mean, the possibilities are horrific and endless, and I’m not inclined to linger, but it permanently affected those children.
But the thing that I find the most unsettling? Chances are, you’ve met someone like Tom Riddle. More than once, even. We encounter them on a daily basis, the callous disregard, the overblown sense of importance, the manipulative discourse. When those people have enough charisma (and they often do), they can do untold amounts of damage. We can tell from this exchange that Dumbledore sees this in Tom. No, he’s not prepared to swear up and down that the kid is going to become the most powerful Dark Wizard of an age, but you can’t so early on. Some kids take time to learn empathy and grow out of those traits.
And others become the Lord Voldemorts of the world.
One key bit in this conversation: Tom assumes that his father must be the magical one out of his parents because his mother died and magical people shouldn’t, according to him. Right here we find the roots of his obsession with cheating death—in Tom’s mind, someone with the kind of powers he possesses should be able to sidestep such a thing. It’s tied to his sense of superiority, yes, but could it also be tied up in a twisted desire to do what he believed his mother should have been able to do after giving birth to him? I think it’s pretty likely. And that’s… sad. In just a normal human way.
Dumbledore gives Harry his Three Things to Notice About Voldemort, and Harry makes the comment about expecting to see the mouth organ in the office, which leads to that great quote above. It’s a clever way of alluding to horcruxes without spelling it out. The first trophies Tom Riddle took were merely objects—eventually, they will become something far worse.
Chapter 14—Felix Felicis
Summary
Harry tells Ron and Hermione about the lesson the next day in Herbology. Ron can’t figure out why these lessons are helpful, but Hermione thinks that it makes sense to learn as much as possible about Voldemort to find his weaknesses. Harry asks about the latest Slug Club party, and Hermione says that he drones on and loves McLaggen a bit too much, but that the food is good, and he introduced them to Gwenog Jones. Professor Sprout gives them flak for talking and the trio get to work prying pods from Snargaluff stumps. Hermione tells Harry that he won’t be able to miss the next one (a Christmas party) because Slughorn asked her to check his free days. Ron loses one of the pods during this conversation, and Harry goes to retrieve it. By the time he gets back Ron and Hermione are having a tiff over the party, Ron suggesting that Hermione hook up with McLaggen. Hermione tells Ron that she had planned to bring him as her guest, but seeing as he thought it was stupid and would rather that she hooked up with McLaggen… and Ron admits that he wouldn’t rather she did that. Harry tries to work loudly to avoid hearing their conversation, but that doesn’t work out. Finally, he breaks a bowl, and they remember he’s nearby, both looking flustered and embarrassed. (Though Ron is rather pleased too.)
Harry has a moment to think on it—he has long-suspected that this sort of thing might happen between Ron and Hermione, but he’s worried about the potential fallout either way. If they break up, it could ruin their friendships, and if they don’t, he could become a third wheel. He watches them more closely, but nothing seems to change besides their level of politeness, so he figures he’ll have to wait and see what goes down during the party. With Katie gone, he has to replace another Chaser, so he corners Dean after Transfiguration and asks him. Dean is pleased—Seamus Finnigan is not, and soon the whole House is talking about Harry picking another player from his year to be on the team. Harry figures he’s dealt with worse mutters from classmates, and is pleased with Dean in practice. In fact, he’s pleased with the whole team except for Ron, whose nerves are getting to him again. Ginny scores several goals against him, and Ron becomes so erratic that he punches Demelza Robins in the mouth. Ginny gives him hell for it, and Harry faux-scolds her for going all Quidditch captain on her brother when it’s technically his job. The practice is terrible overall after that, but Harry keeps it upbeat and tries to get Ron’s confidence up.
As they’re heading back to the common room, they come across Dean and Ginny kissing, and Harry’s internal monologue sudden goes berserk with thoughts of blood and claws and scales, so he’s clearly not pleased. Ron is also upset, and Ginny sends Dean away to have a word with Ron. She tells him off for essentially trying to slut-shame her, then points out that Ron has never been snogged in his life and would probably mind less if he got to it. They both have their wands out, and Harry tries to get between them. Ginny keeps it up, pointing out that Hermione has kissed Victor and Harry kissed Cho, and he’s the only one who’s behind the curve. She stalks off near to tears, and Ron is livid. Harry tries to tell himself that he was only upset because Ginny is Ron’s sister and promptly has an unbidden fantasy about kissing her himself, which is quickly usurped by visions of Ron trying to murder him. Ron asks Harry if he thinks Hermione really did make out with Viktor, and while Harry doesn’t answer, Ron realizes that he’s sure she did. That night Harry lays awake trying to convince himself that his feelings for Ginny are brotherly, and when that starts to seem unlikely, he simply decides that she’s off-limits due to the potential of ruining his friendship with Ron over it.
The next day Ron is ignoring Ginny and Dean, and horribly cruel to Hermione (who has no idea where the behavior is coming from). The attitude does not abate after a few days, and it makes his Keeper skills worse, as he becomes aggressive and yells at his teammates even as they get every single goal past him. Harry threatens to take Ron off the team if he doesn’t change the way he’s acting, and Ron decides that he’ll play the upcoming game since Harry doesn’t have time to replace him—but if they lose that game he’s resigning. Harry tries various tactics to make Ron buck up, but nothing works. He has a sudden spark of inspiration before bed and at breakfast, he slips something into Ron’s drink before handing it to him. Hermione notices and calls Harry on it, but he won’t admit to it; Hermione clearly thinks it’s the Felix Felicis. Once they reach the locker rooms, Ginny informs Harry that one of the Slytherin Chasers is too sore to play, and that Malfoy is sick. Ron thinks that the both occurrences are strangely lucky, and it suddenly occurs to him that Felix might be involved as well. Harry does nothing to dispel his inkling.
They begin the game, and the announcer is now Zacharias Smith, who takes great pains to make the Gryffindors look bad, suggesting that Harry’s team is built on favoritism. He shuts up once the team starts killing it during the match, with Ron making excellent saves and Ginny scoring an abundance of points. The sub-in Slytherin Seeker—a boy named Harper—deliberately checks Harry when Madam Hooch’s back is turned, making a nasty comment about Ron. Harper sees the Snitch and rushes after it, but while Harry is chasing him, he asks him how much Malfoy paid him to play the game in his stead. It causes Harper to give pause and Harry catches the Snitch. As the crowd goes nuts, Ginny “accidentally” crashes into the commenter podium, claiming she forgot to brake. Post-match, Hermione confronts Harry and Ron in the locker room to scold Harry for what he’s done. He tells them the truth: he never put the potion in, he just wanted Ron to think he had to boost his confidence. Ron is astounded, but then turns on Hermione for thinking that he couldn’t do the job without the potion. He leaves, and Hermione refuses to go to the post-match party, tired of Ron being so unkind to her. Harry is confused, thinking that his plan was supposed to bring Ron and Hermione back together.
When he gets back to the common room he is cornered by various Gryffindors, and then runs into Ginny, who calls Ron a hypocrite and points to where he’s snogging Lavender Brown. Harry spots Hermione enter and then leave the common room, and rushes after her, finding her in the first unlocked classroom he comes across. Hermione has a ring of canaries zooming around her head, and claims that she just left for a bit of practice. Then she mentions Ron’s enjoyment of the party, and Ron and Lavender choose that precise moment to enter the same classroom. Lavender ducks out while Ron tries to pretend that nothing is out of the ordinary. Hermione tells him not to keep Lavender waiting and starts to retreat, but before she leaves the room, she sends the flock of birds she conjured into attack mode and they descend on Ron. Harry is fairly sure that he hears Hermione sob before she slams the door in her wake.
Commentary
Hermione hits the nail on the head pretty quickly, understanding that Harry’s lessons are about learning how to defeat Voldemort by knowing him. Though she describes it as learning his “weaknesses,” which isn’t precisely true. It’s more knowing the in and outs of your opponent, everything that makes them up. More comprehensive than a list of weaknesses.
Their Herbology lesson is such a amazing backdrop to everything going on. This bit in particular:
“Anyway,” said Hermione, continuing their interrupted conversation as though a lump of wood had not just attacked them […]
Classic.
This is going to be a place where people diverge because plenty of fans hate all the romance stuff, and I just love it, okay? It’s funny and it’s nice have a change of stakes in the middle of an active war. What’s more, I love the subtlety of how Rowling brings it up on Harry’s end; Ron and Hermione have had this dance going for years at this point, but Harry’s internal monologue has never acknowledged it. When he finally does, we learn that he’s always sort of known it was coming, he just chose not to actively think about because it wasn’t affecting the present. But it’s sweet, and his concern over how their relationships will all change if his two best friends start dating is realistic and kind. In fact, he spends much of this chapter trying to mend things between them (which we’ll get to in a bit).
This entire chapter is full of perfect visuals. Here’s another, after Harry is left in the classroom with Seamus, who’s ticked off that Dean got picked as the new Chaser over him:
He sprinted out of the room, leaving Harry and Seamus alone together, an uncomfortable moment made no easier when a bird dropping landed on Seamus’s head as one of Hermione’s canaries whizzed over them.
And then we get to Ginny and Dean kissing and Harry going bonkers with jealousy (while being hilariously surprised by that emotion). The metaphors are clunky, but he’s a teenager, so I’ll cut him some slack. But here is where I part company with Ron until he pulls his head out of his butt because HE IS SUCH A JERK IN THIS CHAPTER, I JUST WANNA SMACK HIM. I kinda want to pull the whole Weasley family into this and society at large, because Ron’s concern that people will think his sister is a “loose woman” or whatever the hell you wanna call it is down to his lack of experience, but also down to being taught that a “loose woman” is a thing in the first place, and moreover, a thing that your sister should be ashamed to be. She’s just kissing a dude. I get that it’s awkward, but it’s also not a place where he gets to have an opinion.
So Ginny sort of flips out (and I get it because Ron having reaction in front of her boyfriend and Harry is very not okay), and she brings up Ron’s relative lack of experience, while pointing out that his close friends have that experience. We can be pretty sure that Ginny isn’t mistaken here because she and Hermione have been hanging out for years at this point, and Hermione doesn’t have many female friends to confide this sort of thing in. But Ron, oblivious Ron, actually thinks there was a chance in hell that Hermione dated Viktor Krum for half a year, and never bothered getting any action in all that time. Which is hilariously out of touch.
We’ve got poor Harry trying to force his way between them during the fight while trying to get hold of his own feelings in the matter, and I can’t help but feel the worst for him since the whole fight is a blindside to him in more ways than one. Thing is, Ginny has a valid point; on the maturity level, Ron is way behind his friends, and his little sister for that matter. But with Ron’s self-esteem issues, he takes that message to heart in the nastiest way possible. At this point, I don’t care about his self-esteem, I care that he is essentially shaming Hermione for daring to consider another guy beside him WITHOUT HER KNOWLEDGE. He’s just an assh*le to her for days for no reason he’s willing to admit. (Ron, the reason is because you’ve realized that Hermione has a measure of sexuality and you’re scared. Now grow up.)
This genius trick that Harry plays with the luck potion to pull Ron out of that self-esteem rut backfires beautifully when Ron turns it around and makes it all about Hermione not believing in him, and then hooks up with Lavender on a rebound because LET’S JUST HEAP MORE DOUBLE-STANDARDS ON THIS FIGHT WHY DON’T WE? So yeah, it hurts. It’s probably Ron’s lowest point as a character (the stuff in the next books is less petty in my opinion), and while I understand that this is actually a needed part of his development, it doesn’t stop me from wanting to throttle him.
I’m so angry that I can’t even bring myself to get into Draco’s paying someone to fly for him and stuff, so I suppose that’ll come up later. Huff.
Huff huff.
Emmet Asher-Perrin is going to have a lot of stern words with Ron, though, seriously. You can bug her on Twitter and Tumblr, and read more of her work here and elsewhere.
With that trip on memory lane, we understand at last why Dumbledore was the only one who Voldemort ever feared – at least, I only understood it by this point: he was the first one (and I’m guessing, for a very long time, the only one) who confronted him with his evil deeds and made him pay for them. It also helped that he was probably the only one who knew about the traits described above, that he revealed early in his life.
I do have a slight problem with Voldemort’s origins. There’s a bit of genetic predestination to his evil. The Gaunts are all bad and so of course he is too. Some of this might be easier to accept if he’d had a few years in the ungentle hands of his grandfather, but he’s orphaned at birth and turns out like many of his other relatives anyway. It’s a tiny bit problematic, but there does appear to be a genetic component to some of the mental disorders he may suffer from, so I dunno.
You may want to hit Ron over the head for his behavior here, but it feels very true. As does Harry’s worrying about the effects of the thing between Ron and Hermione on the trio’s friendship and worrying about how his own feelings for Ginny could mess up his relationship with Ron. Of course, it turns out Ron would be thrilled, since he trusts Harry implicitly and thinks of him practically as family anyway, but Harry doesn’t know that.
I also think GInny really hits Ron below the belt here, even if there is some truth to it. It comes out extra nasty and dragging Harry and Hermione into it makes it even worse. If they’d been alone it would have still made him mad, but he might have been able to digest it over time. Instead, she, shall we call it virgin-shames him in front of his best friend and the one person he has really deep feelings for.
At this point in the series I am so frustrated with Dumbledore it’s all I can do not to refer to him as Dimblewit. No. Scratch that. I just call him Dimblewit. By the end of Goblet of Fire it’s time to stop messing around with Harry and the truth. Voldemort is back. He’s tried to kill Harry, again. He’s murdered someone else who got in the way. And all of it is basically Dimblewit’s fault. I know. I know. Plot points. Three more books. More characters to kill, and a few new ones to introduce before they’re killed. But still Harry deserves the whole truth. Everything Dumbledore knows. Thinks he knows. Might have known. Every memory. Every everything. Yesterday. It’s a miracle this kid makes it out of the story alive.
Ron is a nitwit. I’m not one to quibble with the ship. But one does wonder what Hermione sees in him at this point. He deserves Lavender Brown.
Is Ginny more frustrated with Ron because he cares that she’s kissing someone? Or is she more irritated that Harry doesn’t seem to? When I read that scene about him stepping between them during that argument I always wince and wonder what would happen if the wrath of Weasley fell on his head.
@2 – I have the same reaction to you about the ‘virgin shaming’ (and I went through my own fair bit of it in high school and college), BUT, I do think the only reason Ginny ends up hitting below the belt is because Ron already got there; she’s right in that he’s being hypocritical and that a huge part of his issue is that a)he hasn’t kissed anybody yet so he feels offended that his younger sister has (I don’t have siblings close in age, but this definitely seems to be a dynamic I’ve seen in close siblings) and b)he has a (perhaps unconscious) double standard of appropriate behavior for boys vs. girls. So, honestly, I think she makes a good point. :) And yes, this is Ron’s low point.
Regarding Voldy – I never realized until this read he was born on NYE. My younger son was born on NYE! So, now I can say he shares a birthday with Voldemort :)
I think the part with him thinking his mom couldn’t have been magical is really quite sad – I think there was definitely a part of him that felt that grief (until it got twisted), and possibly realizing that she was magical and died anyway…..I can see how that would lead to the obsession with death.
A cold one is a humidifier, a hot one is a vaporaror. I think the Internet has lots of explanations for which one is better.
When you were describing little Riddle, it reminded me of some things I read about Donald Trump.
I feel bad for Lavender. Whatever comments anyone wants to make about her maturity or shallowness of her feelings, she actually had a crush on Ron, as evidenced by her behavior in earlier chapters. Whereas Ron is only hooking up with her because he’s an ass and is basically using her. She even gets a birthday present for him when he’s basically just waiting for the relationship to die, obviously trying to make it something special. And no one DID bother to tell her he was in the hospital wing. Then the breakup happens in a pretty bad way, and oh yeah, she gets to have her face chewed off in the next book.
And while the movie goes to lengths to show her as a complete ninny, I think the only things in this book were that Ron didn’t appreciate her necklace, and that the other characters thought “Won Won” was silly. So here she is actually happy to be in this relationship, while her ass of a boyfriend and his friends are taking her for a ride.
IMO, Harry’s reveal of actually not using Felix Felicis on Ron is better in the movie than in the book. In the movie, Harry holds up the stopped-up, full vial for Hermione to see and has a sly smile.
Thanks for reading my musings.
AndrewHB
@2,5: Yes! My sympathy was with Ron for that part of the chapter. Ginny either didn’t know about his feelings for Hermione or wanted to be extra cruel by pointing out Hermione/Victor, but she nailed the reason for Ron’s anger. He thinks he can do nothing that one or more of his brothers haven’t done first and better, and now his younger sibling is outpacing him on something important to him, saying he has the experience of a 12-year-old and couldn’t possibly have been kissed. I know the feeling well; my five-years-younger brother has had many girlfriends and I’ve never had a significant other.
So he goes for Lavender to prove to himself and everyone else that he can get a girl if he wants to, which is gross as crzydroid notes. And my sympathy moves to Hermione. Did he intend to hurt her with this? In any case, she’s devastated. When I learned that a guy I crushed on had just gotten a girlfriend…I would have sicced a flock of birds (or worse) on them if I could have, instead of just hitting everyone in reach with a plastic porcupinefish.
Also agree that this chapter seems to be arguing for nature over nurture. From what we glimpse, Tom’s childhood home was bleak and loveless but lacking preferential treatment and deliberate mistreatment, while Harry grew up with people who openly despised and abused him while showering affection on another child who participated in the abuse. Yet it’s stated that Harry is especially “selfless,” compassionate, and companionable (barring normal angst/grief/PTSD) while Tom has been a sadist from the start, incapable of empathy or healthy relationships. (And what does it say that Dudley, thoroughly adored by his parents, grew up to be a brutal bully though not half as evil as Voldemort? Possibly ditto for Draco)
I don’t know what young Tom did to those poor kids in the cave, but I’m betting it was something with snakes in it. Shudder.
The wizarding world really seems to be pretty casual about all those Muggle-born magical children and their first eleven years. A lot can happen to a kid in that time.
I don’t much care for Dumbledore in this flashback. “Muggle-lover” though he’s supposed to be, he’s got no compunction about messing with that matron’s mind, and getting her drunk in the middle of her work day as well. Surely he could have found a method with a little more finesse to it?
Supposedly, Harry stays a decent person in spite of the Dursleys because he had that first year with his loving parents. It’s true that babies need to be secure about the affection of their caretakers in order to thrive. But on the one hand, some children from loving families do seem to have a genetic predisposition to sociopathy, and on the other hand, we presume that none of the other children from that orphanage grew up to be evil overlords.
Better Romance than Quidditch. And this is all so hilariously awful, you feel bad for all of them while thanking whatever gods there be that it isn’t you any more.
Harry also got a lot of TLC in the Weasley household, starting in his first summer break, and that must have helped nurture his goodness. But by that point, he was already markedly different from Tom.
Ok so here’s where I want to bring up a point that hasn’t really been touched on yet. The Imperius Curse. It seems so simple, but it’s really not at all. So you have total control over someone’s actions and even thoughts. However you apparently don’t need to be present to exert it. So how in the eff does that work? Do you see everything that’s going on in their head at all times? Or does your control only kick in when you want it to? If that were the case wouldn’t a lot of people just cut off mid-sentence, stop what they’re doing, and start following your orders? Wouldn’t that be a big tip-off that they’re cursed? And didn’t GOF mention some visible signs? How would wizards not be aware of them?
I have to think that the curse isn’t always running “in the background” while the victim runs on autopilot completely unaware because if that were the case Imposter Moody would have just left Harry under the influence, nobody would have been the wiser, and the plot would have been over within a chapter of that lesson. In a book with an already flimsy premise I have to give JKR more credit than to assume the curse worked like that the whole time.
The only other explanation I can think of is the great point that was brought up earlier: Maybe Malfoy had outside help. The problem with that, though, is how secretive Malfoy was about the whole thing. So we’re left to assume that teenager Malfoy was better at the Imperius Curse than full-grown Crouch was despite the latter having years of more intimate experience with it, and that all leaves the problem of how you can control a person’s actions without seeing the person.
Sorry for the rant, I’ve just been so curious about this!
I don’t think Ginny would have resorted to virgin-shaming if Ron hadn’t basically called her a whore…
Also, I read a fanfic from Lavender’s POV where she plots with Parvati to get Hermione and Ron together, because those two are so obvious except to each other, and she only dates him to be as obnoxious as possible (with the Won-Won and the necklace and the clingy jealous stuff) so he can see how awesome Hermione is in comparison. XD
Adding to the points about Tom’s nature or nurture: seeing Emily’s summary above put together two things that made me think:
“Tom was born in the orphanage on New Year’s Eve, his mother dying an hour after the birth…”
The two events being paired that way gives them extra impact: Voldemort was born on the edge of death (of the year). Voldemort was born on the edge of death (of his mother).
No wonder he’s so terrified of it. But are the two there as omens, so the events themselves haunt his life (nature), or were they mentioned by his carers the first time he did anything nasty – ‘You know what happened when he was born…’ (nurture)?
Oh – and another aggravating thing about Ron this week is that he’s so wrapped up in himself that he nearly doesn’t notice Harry’s efforts. Harry’s even been clever enough to fake the Felix in front of Hermione, because he knows she’ll notice and that’ll tip off Ron. But even using her as a neon sign doesn’t work. So when Ron finally calls something lucky, I breathed a sigh of relief. But no! He’s still not noticed. Harry must have wanted to shake him by that point. So it’s very lucky the second lucky thing came along and Ron’s brain started working at last…
And we move into some of my favorite bits of HBP. I must admit, HBP is my favorite HP book to read, and part of it is simply because of these romance bits. Yes, I find them both hilarious and heart-warming. Of course in my case, it’s partly because of when I read this book. I read this back in college, and soon after reading, I met my roommate and best friend’s little sister. We connected right away, but I spent several years persuading myself that I couldn’t date her – “best friend’s little sister!!!” And so this book and all the Harry/Ginny parts felt very real to me. Apart from the fact that I’ve always liked Ginny, having a real-life example of this really makes me emotionally connect to this book. I still think HBP is the best book of the series – even without the romance bits! – but just wanted to share.
And for the Ron/Ginny interaction…ugh. Ron’s being terrible, Ginny doesn’t hold back and is pretty terrible herself and it’s just terrible all the way around. I agree that I really hate Ron in this whole section…he behaves abominably. Sadly, it’s pretty realistic too…Ron is jealous of his little sister(and well…everyone), and then(as pointed out above), he just uses Lavender because he wants a girlfriend and some action. And ends up hurting Hermione oh so much. I hate seeing Hermione being hurt like this…really felt the movie did a great job with showing this. (Oh yes – I also love the HBP movie…I know that’s a bit of a controversial view, but I do love it! So hilarious!!)
Also – I really love all the Quidditch sequences…practices, games, etc – see they get a lot of hate from people here though. Why is Quidditch so disliked in general? (Love Harry’s calling Ron out when Ron’s being a punk…”you’re my best mate but…you keep this up and you’re out!!” Good job Harry. Ron – stop being such a jerk!!)
ugh… imagining what Tom Riddle did to the children in the cave is not a path I want to go down… sometimes imagination is a horrible thing. I never before connected Riddle’s comments about his mother’s death and the horvcruxes. Good catch I think.
I love the teenage romance chapters… they seem pretty spot on to me. I could see all of it happening IRL.
“as though a lump of wood had not just attacked them” is right up there with “enjoy time with his remaining limbs” as a fun bit of background business.
So again we come back to Merope Gaunt, who cuts herself off from magic once more due a different kind of abuse: abandonment.
Are you freaking kidding me? Tom Riddle was drugged, kidnapped, raped, and held against his will for months before he was finally able to escape. And you view that escape as him abusing his assailant? That he is the bad guy for getting away from her? That she is the victim here?
What is wrong with you?
@17, that’s a good point, but it’s more complicated than that. There’s a subtext here that I don’t think we’ve discussed yet. Tom gets married to Merope, to “the daughter of that tramp” or something like it, to everyone’s surprise, then comes home before the year is up saying he was “hoodwinked” and he’s welcomed back into the family. In other words, all the neighbors assume that he got Merope pregnant and was forced to marry her, but it turned out to be false so he left her. Remember that he is the son of the richest landowner in the valley, and she is basically a poor peasant. It makes me think of the alleged Droit du seigneur, and relatedly the idea that the son of the rich lord could have his way with the lower class women of the village without social condemnation, so long as he didn’t get them pregnant, and so long as he eventually married (preferably a virgin) within his own class.
Put another way, Tom’s parents and neighbors thought that he had been screwing around with the poor locals and got one of them pregnant. Then when it turned out she wasn’t pregnant, he abandoned her. And they were OK with this. And Tom was OK with them thinking this, because it didn’t harm his social status the way that claiming “witchcraft” might have. Screwing around with the poor locals from a position of great wealth and power also meets some modern definitions of rape.
And, looking again at Bob Ogden’s memory, I wonder if Tom wasn’t already taking advantage of Merope. Rowling doesn’t make it plain, but think about Morfin’s jab, “do you think he’d marry you?” Would he say that if all Merope had ever done was pine at him from the window? Supposing that Tom and Merope had already been having relations, and he was making (false) promises of marriage and maybe wealth and other things, and then he turns up in the carriage with his real financee.
We know–thanks to magical memories–that Merope probably “drugged” Tom with a love potion, which in modern equivalent amounts to rape and kidnapping. But his friends and family didn’t know that, and what they did think of him — and accepted as appropriate or at least forgivable behavior from someone of his station — was pretty awful.
The other thing about Merope is that she was an abused child who followed that up by abusing someone else when she had the chance. Not nice, but not uncommon.
These were very…amusing? funny? interesting? we’ll go with entertaining chapters. While Ron’s behavior is immature and altogether not nice, it kind of rings true to that age and social issues among teenagers.
@11 – The Imperius curse obviously puts one under the curser’s control, but it does not seem to make one an automaton that mindlessly goes about only what is ordered. It may depend on the skill and ability of the one casting the curse, as well as the ability of the victim to resist (Harry is pretty much immune, if Voldemort can’t Imperius you, you’re good–and Barty Crouch Sr. seemed to partially fight it off as well), but the person under the curse seems to be able to act normally and use quite a bit of discretion in carrying out orders, if given leeway by their assailant. Otherwise, it would be quite useless unless one could constantly be in the victim’s presence.
It seems Draco had Madame Rosemerta under the Imperious curse most of the school year, though it may have had to be renewed from time to time. It does not surprise me at all that Draco is a skilled practitioner of the curse, given his family’s obsession with the Dark Arts, and Madame Rosemerta may not be a powerful enough witch to resist very much, who knows.
@18 but it’s more complicated than that.
No. It is not. But nice job invoking your own head canon to try and justify this, which it can’t be. You have decided, with no evidence whatsoever, that the rest of the town was ok with Tom coming back (we were told it was a scandal, remember?), and justified it based on what you have decided his ancestors did. Then you have decided that they were involved, which again is something you made up whole cloth, because to you that would cover most of it. No. No, it still doesn’t excuse him being drugged, kidnapped, raped, and imprisoned. Would it be ok with you to do this to Jenna or Barbra Bush because W was terrible? If a guy went on a date with a woman, would it be ok with you for him to then do it to the woman? Spike her drink with roofies, drag her off, rape her, and hold her against her will? Because that’s exactly the case you are laying out here, just with the genders reversed. But according to you, its ok then, and according to Emily, the woman escaping is then abusing her rapist by abandoning him.
@19 The other thing about Merope is that she was an abused child who followed that up by abusing someone else when she had the chance. Not nice, but not uncommon.
Appeals to diegetics aside, exactly what is the excuse for Emily or @18 to bash the victim of Merope’s crimes as the abuser and Merope as the victim?
crzydroid likens Tom Riddle to Trump – I think many politicians are sociopaths.
@20 That’s sort of how I felt about it, but we still run into the problem of how it’s shown in the fourth book. Harry’s definitely not “immune” to it, he completely loses his mind and is barely able to fight off the curse. Actually he only fights off the “jump”, he’s still physically acting out under its influence until that point. It’s pretty clear that the curse directly affects your physical actions. Meanwhile his mind is completely cloudy. He’s not consciously aware of what’s going on around him. I don’t know why pondering the logistics of this interests me so much but it’s like a complex puzzle of how does the curse feel to the caster? Do they see through the eyes of the victim? versus how does the curse feel to the victim?
@21 I have to agree with that. Merope’s actions are understandable, but not forgivable because she did make Tom marry her against his will. I understand that you don’t want to consider Tom leaving her as “abandonment” but, whether she did it to herself or not, she was still a pregnant woman left alone, which is always traumatic.
I don’t think there’s a clear abuser and a clear victim in this situation.
Hello, all–just a reminder to keep the discussion civil, and avoid making personal judgements or attacks on other commenters with whom you disagree. Thanks.
A point I’d make about Tom Riddle Sr. is that he is apparently still living with his parents when he is at least in his thirties, which seems very unusual for a upper-class man. It was during the war as well, so you have to ask why he wasn’t an officer or doing something war related. Now it is possible that he was just visiting his parents the night Voldermort attacked but it strains credibility. It all makes me suspect that while his parents may have welcomed him back, Riddle Sr. was ostracised both as someone who was a bit of a joke (“he got seduced by the tramp’s daughter, what a laugh”) and if people decided that he had abandoned his pregnant wife instead of being tricked (which isn’t implausible given that the Riddles were not popular), then that would only worsen things.
Its a pretty complicated situation for a reader. Merope is a pitiable character who does something unforgivable and Riddle Sr. is a horrible character who has something unforgivable done to him. It is a really clever way of mixing up Voldermort’s origin story.
teg
Everybody, just to make this perfectly clear: when I say that Merope was abandoned, I’m talking about the situation from her own perspective. I don’t think that Tom Riddle owed her a thing. I also don’t think that Merope is entirely in her right mind, be it from the treatment of her family, or from disorders caused by inbreeding, or some combination of the two. From the little that we hear, she seems to have a tenuous grasp on reality. Dumbledore himself points out that she likely stopped giving Riddle love potions because she had hoped that he had grown to truly love her over the time they spent together. The fact that she even considered that speaks to her mental state.
I AM NOT saying that Tom Riddle had culpability in his own abuse. I am saying that Merope Gaunt believed that he had grown to love her, and then he quickly left. From her perspective, she was abandoned by the man she loved. That is not the reality of the situation, but because she believed it, she was effected by it.
Additionally, as I mentioned in the post, there is an aspect of abandonment by society at work as well–which has nothing to do with Tom. The fact that it was so easy for Burke to take advantage of her, the fact that she had to give birth in an orphanage because she had nowhere else to go, the fact that she had been abandoned by her family emotionally her entire life… these are also factors in her development and part of the narrative that led to her death.
Good commentary, Emily, as always.
The Ron and Hermione angle never fails to be uncomfortable and bringing Ginny into things really starts rocking the boat. Ron goes full on big brother and was out of bounds in chastising Ginny publicly (she was only kissing the dude). Of course, she gets upset and immediately hits back with full force right where she knew he was most vulnerable. So I don’t really like either of them in this scene. Neither is really justified. And since Ron doesn’t ever seem to know how to STOP BEING A MASSIVE A-HOLE once he makes a mistake, he just keeps taking it out on everyone until Harry calls him on it. Poor Hermione, she really puts up with a lot of crap.
Once Ron works out his inferiority issues, he is much better to be around. He has always been somewhat jealous of Harry and has secretly always worried that Hermione likes Harry better. It makes him extremely sensitive to anything relating to Hermione, which unfortunately he tends to take out on her, even though it’s his own issue. Ah, the days of being a teenager. Thank heavens they’re gone forever…
The bit that I both was annoyed with and admired in OoTP and HBP is that the teenagers are teenagers. They are dumb in teenage ways, they hurt each other in teenage ways, etc. They’re no longer just kids, but they are by no means adults. As much as I really disliked how Ron acted first towards Ginny and then around Lavender, it was what many a teenage boy would do. Hell, I could see myself doing something equally stupid at the age of 14-15.
What actually made Ron and Hermione my OTP was Cuarón’s Prisoner of Azkaban movie. The little bit where they grab each others hands during a tense moment, see what they have done afterwards and jump apart. It was a “of course” moment in my mind.
“Harry is fairly sure that he hears Hermione sob before she slams the door in her wake.”
It might have been Lavender outside Harry heard the sob come from since Hermione just injured her boyfriend. But then it only said Harry thought he heard a sob, not that he was fairly sure even.
Hi Emily,
While Ron’s behaviour in Chapter 14 is undoubtedly terrible, he should have acted a lot better and this is a very low point for him, I do have to point a couple of things in his defence that you haven’t mentioned.
Ron values honesty and openness a lot, sometimes a little too much. His fight with Harry happened partially because he thought Harry went around and did something behind his back not because Harry got the glory again. I think he must be really hurt that Hermione did not bother to mention her experience with Krum with him and instead seemed to keep telling him that Krum is nothing more than a pen pal, it probably made him wonder what else Hermione was keeping from him. I think Ron blew up at Hermione after the Quidditch because he always valued Hermione’s opinion of him a lot like how he get annoyed with her when he believed she thought he was lousy at Quidditch in OotP.
You’re right that his behaviour towards Ginny was influenced by his family as well and I think in particular by his mother who thought Hermione was a scarlet woman in GoF because of that Rita Skeeter article. Also the twins were overprotective of Ginny as well remember in the scene at the joke shop?
I was fine with Ginny’s retort to Ron that he should go and get a bit experience himself until she brought up that Hermione snogged Krum (bringing other people into a fight is just too below the belt). Ron was being a stupidly overprotective brother no doubt about it, he might be on the verge of calling Ginny a slut but he restrained himself which you have to give him a bit of credit for. However it was highly unlikely she couldn’t see how Ron and Hermione were attracted to each other by that point since as you noted Hermione is pretty much her best female friend so she was effectively undermining their relationship which cannot really be justified. I hope Hermione didn’t tell Ginny about Victor in confidence because that would make Ginny look even worse in this scene.
Finally I thought Hermione’s bird attack was pretty nasty really.
EDIT: Some extra thoughts about what Ginny did there. As someone who generally liked your commentary, I feel you’re letting Ginny off the hook too easily here compared with Ron. Based on what we saw in GoF, we cannot even be sure that Hermione did snog Krum (and there were lots of debates before about whether Hermione was Krum’s girlfriend). Ginny could have simply made things up and rolled it along with the fact that Harry snogged Cho. Also Ginny’s lack of any remorse or attempts to make amends when Ron/Lavender happened was pretty bad. Why couldn’t she at least show she was sorry for what happened on behalf of Hermione?
So, when Ginny goes from Michael Corner to Dean Thomas, she gets “Girl knows what she wants. Respect.”, but when Ron, who just had his immaturity and lack of romantic experience called out, by his sister no less, and then decides to get some experience with a girl clearly interested in him, he gets “Rebound”, and YOU call HIM on a double standard? Really?
Ginny’s attitude seems to be ‘the boy I like isn’t interested so let’s find somebody else.’ Ron’s is ‘Everybody has somebody but me! Oh look, Lavender likes me!’ Neither attitude strikes me as being blameworthy. It is unfortunate that Lavender is looking for a serious relationship which Ron is so not ready for and that he’s too much of a coward to be honest with her but he is just a kid. And Ginny’s playing the field may be causing a certain amount of hearthache too.
Ginny’s choice to start dating Michael Corner is perhaps a better parallel, but there’s no evidence she entered that relationship insincerely, and they certainly never drew attention to themselves; with respect to Dean Thomas, she announced their relationship after it had already begun, thus implying it was her choice rather than a reaction to any external situation. In contrast, we know that Ron started up with Lavender very soon after not only being called out by his sister but also right after getting his BMOC moment from the quidditch match; so, however genuine Lavender’s intentions may have been, Harry (and thus the reader) has good reason to suspect that Ron was primarily taking advantage of an opportunity to challenge other people’s expectations of him. His later choice to flaunt his activities with Lavender to his classmates, and Hermione in particular, reinforces the idea that he was more interested in how others perceived him than he was in Lavender. Many people (not just teenagers!) make that same mistake at least once in their dating lives, so it’s too common to be truly ‘blameworthy’, but most of those people also realize eventually that it was a mistake to be avoided if possible.
So really, I don’t think there is a double standard here, just a contrast between two siblings taking very different approaches…and perhaps some consensus that one path is a bit more constructive than the other.
ETA: Oh yeah, let’s not forget that both Ron’s immaturity and Ginny’s maturity with respect to matters of the heart are both used in the service of significant plot points in Deathly Hallows, so the implications that one’s approach is preferable to the other’s is not so much the projection of reader biases as it is foreshadowing.
Ginny is self aware, she knows her own motives, feelings and intentions and communicates them honestly. Dean and Michael may be hurt by the end of their relationship with her but they haven’t been led on or gotten mixed signals.
On the other hand Ron’s motives, emotions and intentions are a confused mess even to him. He is angry with Hermione and Ginny. He feels left out romantically and uncertain of his attractiveness. So naturally he flaunts Lavender and yes he is not thinking about her needs and wants. Ron leads her on, confuses her with mixed messages and in the end hurts her badly not out of malice but immaturity and lack of self awareness.
At that age, 90% of the time the relationship is beyond the participant’s understanding.
So true.
“ETA: Oh yeah, let’s not forget that both Ron’s immaturity and Ginny’s maturity with respect to matters of the heart are both used in the service of significant plot points in Deathly Hallows, so the implications that one’s approach is preferable to the other’s is not so much the projection of reader biases as it is foreshadowing.”
Sorry Ian, as much as I agree with the rest of your post I have to say I found Ginny’s horrid behaviour here anything but mature. Ron’s accusation was that other people might see her as a slut/whore, it’s a very nasty accusation but it’s a legitimate concern here. You only need to look at the slut-shaming of girls (by both men and women!) in the real world to see that. However, Ginny’s response was to drag Hermione into it by claiming she snogged Viktor Krum when we don’t even know for sure this happened (and if Hermione did tell her it’s clear she wanted it kept as a secret). This is truly inexcusable especially if Ginny knew about Ron and Hermione’s feelings towards each other and it feels like she is undermining their relationship. The fact that Ginny showed no regrets afterwards just makes it worse.
If she didn’t drag Hermione into it I would have been completely fine with what she said in the context.
@39/torrent56: In my experience, 15-year-olds aren’t known for their maturity. Both Ron’s and Ginny’s reactions make sense in context, regardless of whether you approve of the way either one reacted. In my view, that sort of realism is a better standard for measuring the writing than whether or not you or any other reader liked the behavior of the characters…nor does it change the fact that the scene was foreshadowing (a structural aspect that has nothing to do with aesthetics or morality).
@ian
You’re right I don’t approve either of their behaviour. However the difference is that Ron is called out for his bad behaviour here, but Ginny isn’t. One could argue it’s because Harry sees her better than she is because of the attraction but there are tonnes of people just like Emily the author here who refuses/forgets to say anything bad about Ginny’s behaviour. I can maybe understand Ginny’s angry reaction in the spur of moment, but what about afterwards? Did she show any regrets at all at the pain it caused Hermione?
Sorry I am not sure what foreshadowing is talked about? Is it H/G or R/Hr?
EDIT: I am not judging whether the writing is good or bad, just the behaviour or characters. You claimed “Ginny’s maturity with respect to matters of the heart” that is the part I disagree with.
Ginny may have violated Hermione’s confidence here. If so she should have been sorry.
@41/torrent56: Ah, I think we may have been talking past each other a bit then. ;-)
I probably should have been more precise in comment #35 and referred to Ginny’s relative maturity: she comes into the chapter with a much better understanding than does Ron of what’s appropriate in relationships, but of course she’s still a headstrong 15-year-old with all the baggage that entails. Yes, her tit-for-tat attempt to humiliate him over these things was a hypocritical stroll along the low road…yet it was completely believable given not just the context and her characterization thus far, but also general knowledge of teenage-sibling spats. If commenters are disinclined to call Ginny out for her less-honorable moments, I believe it has less to do with condoning her behavior than it is about seeing those moments as too typical/plausible within context to be worthy of comment. (And describing any of them as ‘inexcusable’ seems quite harsh…I certainly hope I’m not still held to account over stupid/insensitive things I might have said in high school! :-)
As for Hermione, I suspect any issues she had with Ginny were quickly overshadowed by the effects of Ron’s becoming a complete ass starting the next day. The only rift ever shown to arise between the two girls has nothing to do with the events of this particular day, implying that either Hermione was never too worked up about the breach of confidence or that the two of them sorted things out behind the scenes. EDIT: I find no evidence in the text that Ginny broke any confidence, or even that Hermione was bothered by Ron’s finding out what happened. Indeed, the beginning of this chapter makes it clear that Ron’s exclusion from the Slug Club has been causing his relationship with Hermione to fray for a couple of months; Ginny’s taunt here may have added fuel to the fire, but at most she seems to have accelerated the inevitable and Hermione seems to blame no one but Ron.
Regarding foreshadowing, the basic structure of this incident—Ginny asserting her right to conduct her love life as she sees fit, Ron flipping out over it—repeats on Harry’s birthday in DH, chapter 7. YMMV regarding whether the scene here in the corridor has more value on its own merits or as setup for that scene at the Burrow, but I think its difficult to view the similarities as anything but intentional.
@ian,
Ah yes I think we’re on the same page now. It’s true girls do on average understand these things at a younger age than boys so no surprises there and Ginny has been involved in relationships at a younger age than any of the trio members so it’s no surprises she knew more about them.
I think some of the people who disliked Ginny would have lessened their dislike quite a bit if there’s just one time in the last 2 books where Ginny expressed some kind of regret or remorse for what happened (I also think there’s a similar problem with Hermione but to a lesser extent). Remember this isn’t the first time Ginny was nasty to Ron, she also mocked him behind his back with Harry and tripped him when he was under the influence of Veela’s charm.
My view is that I found Ginny’s virgin-shaming Ron (although that might not be true) is within the normal boundary of sibling fights but effectively undermining his relationship with Hermione went too far. I guess I was meaning something different when I said inexcusable because I meant it as “something that shouldn’t be glossed over” like commentators here. Btw Ron’s concern about Ginny being slut-shamed is a pretty normal reaction from older brothers towards their younger sister although he definitely expressed himself in a horrible way.
“As for Hermione, I suspect any issues she had with Ginny were quickly overshadowed by the effects of Ron’s becoming a complete ass starting the next day.”
Yes, he could just have asked her if it’s true or not and demand an explanation.
“EDIT: I find no evidence in the text that Ginny broke any confidence, or even that Hermione was bothered by Ron’s finding out what happened.”
The book doesn’t explain exactly what happened (although I would like to know) but all we saw is that Ginny smirking at Ron/Lavender and not giving a thought about Hermione when she ran away from the party. As for Hermione, nobody even knows when she found out Ron’s reason, if she ever did by the end of the book.
“Indeed, the beginning of this chapter makes it clear that Ron’s exclusion from the Slug Club has been causing his relationship with Hermione to fray for a couple of months; Ginny’s taunt here may have added fuel to the fire, but at most she seems to have accelerated the inevitable”
I am not sure about this because there was a similar experience two years ago at the Yule Ball and Ron was mad with jealousy at that time but Hermione shut him down effectively by telling him to invite her to the next ball. Similarly regarding the Slug Club it was clear to me Hermione shut him down when she said she will invite him to the party and afterwards they were being more polite and formal with each other just like right after the Yule Ball (no fights there!).
“Hermione seems to blame no one but Ron.”
I believe as far as Hermione knows Ron just suddenly got mad at her for no reason at all (before the Quidditch match against Slytherin) and she never found out about Ginny giving away her secret until well afterwards. No wonder she blames Ron.
Foreshadowing – I don’t think Ron flip out in general with the idea of H/G as otherwise he would have done so when they kissed in public and went off afterwards together after the Ravenclaw match. I think we can take Ron’s reaction during the birthday scene in DH at face value, i.e. he was unhappy and thought Harry was leading Ginny on even after breaking up with her.
@44: As a former 16-year-old boy myself, it seems sufficient that 2+ months of building resentment over the Slug Club could result in Ron acting out in exactly the ways he starts doing in this chapter. But his memories of the Yule Ball may help explain why nearly all of his ire crashes down upon Hermione.
Whether Ginny owes Hermione any apology depends almost entirely upon whether the latter specifically asked the former to keep secret anything that went on with Krum; for all we know, it was open knowledge in the Gryffindor girls’ dormitory, and it was kept from Ron & Harry simply to avoid the inevitable drama. It’s certainly true that more overt sensitivity and empathy towards Hermione on Ginny’s part would have softened her characterization; but if JKR had written it that way, I guarantee that some people would complain about touchy-feely filler in a book that was already too long and too focused on teenage angst, while others would insist it was further proof that Ginny was just a Mary Sue. Authors just can’t win! :-)
Regardless of how noble he perceived his intentions to be, both here and in DH Ron steps in to offer his sister ‘protection’ she neither wants nor needs. The insecurity which motivates these ‘interventions’ turns out to be significant to the plot; the stakes are relatively low in this book but end up far more consequential when the cycle repeats in the next one.
@17
Thank you for calling attention to one of the most distressing moments in the series. I also appreciate Emily’s comments in the reread of Chapter 10. When my daughter was six, we read every Harry Potter book together. She could talk for over an hour about life in Hogwarts and what she would do if she was a wizard. (I suggested that she might be a witch, but she informed me that she would be a wizard like Harry.) When we read the part where Dumbledore made excuses for Merope’s behavior, we stopped for a moment and talked about love potions. I said it was really mean of Tom to make fun of Merope’s house, but giving someone a love potion is one of the worst things that you can do to a person. When you give someone a love potion, you force them to change their feelings. You take from them everything that they are. It would be like if someone had cast a spell so that my daughter couldn’t love her parents or her friends anymore. I didn’t want to traumatize her, so we only dwelled on it for a moment, but hopefully it made an impression.
Just to be clear, I don’t mean to suggest that Tom necessarily suffered more than Barty Crouch, who was kept under the Imperious Curse for months; or Ginny, who was forced to write her own suicide note in CoS. But those moments were dwelt on at length in the books. It’s like Rowling herself didn’t realize what a love potion really was, or what it meant for someone to be tricked into drinking one.
In my experience, it seems like people often have trouble noticing violence when it’s perpetrated by a woman. In college, one of my friends unexpectedly became a serial rapist. When she was brought before a disciplinary board on unrelated charges, her sexual assaults were brought to light, but the board members could not comprehend that the assaults were illegal. My mother uses violence and the threat of violence to control our family. When I confronted her, my dad said that I was deluded. But in his unguarded moments, he’ll say in a panicky voice about how he’ll be in “big trouble” if he can’t make her happy. After several years in a miserable marriage, I finally convinced my wife that it’s a form of abuse when she intentionally puts me in life-threatening situations. But very few other people see it that way.
On BoingBoing, a popular recent comment made the point,
It’s depressing that to think that many progressives have come to see violence and sexual misconduct as being acceptable, provided that the perpetrator comes from an underprivileged group. But maybe it won’t always be that way. Not long ago, my daughter’s friend described a fatal skiing accident that she heard about on the radio. She said, “Lots of people died, but all the girls lived, so they can get married.”
My daughter’s reply: “That is still not okay.”
I’m always proud of my daughter, but that was a beautiful moment. Who knows, maybe her generation will succeed where mine failed. It probably won’t happen, but I can dream.
I’m not trying to judge or attack anyone. But I feel a little safer now that I’ve heard from other people who were disturbed by Merope’s behavior, and who were willing to say so.
@ian,
“As a former 16-year-old boy myself, it seems sufficient that 2+ months of building resentment over the Slug Club could result in Ron acting out in exactly the ways he starts doing in this chapter.”
He already let out his resentment in the Herbology lesson and Hermione shut him down. Why would his resentment continue afterwards when he and Hermione was polite to each other if there wasn’t that catalyst? It’s not the same in DH when his resentment and terror was building every day whilst wearing the Horcrux and living in constant fear for his family.
“Whether Ginny owes Hermione any apology depends almost entirely upon whether the latter specifically asked the former to keep secret anything that went on with Krum; for all we know, it was open knowledge in the Gryffindor girls’ dormitory, and it was kept from Ron & Harry simply to avoid the inevitable drama. “
I guess we couldn’t really come to an agreement here given how much information is lacking about the Krum/Hermione romance in GoF. I would just point out there were tonnes of debate before book 6 about whether Hermione actually was Krum’s girlfriend then and leave it at that.
Author couldn’t win – Lol not really. Rowling could have avoided all this by just not including the Lavender love triangle at all and focus on some other real actual issues. Problem solved. But if she decided to take up lots of page space with this issue already, then I cannot see why it causes that much harm by adding a few more lines. She just seems determined to make H/G look better in comparison.
“Regardless of how noble he perceived his intentions to be, both here and in DH Ron steps in to offer his sister ‘protection’ she neither wants nor needs.”
The same could be said of the twins when they withheld their romantic products from Ginny earlier in HBP and they aren’t exactly people who are insecure with girls are they? I don’t see why it’s so difficult to accept it’s a typical big brother action.
“the stakes are relatively low in this book but end up far more consequential when the cycle repeats in the next one.”
Ron brought up that issue ONCE to Harry without shouting during his birthday in DH. Afterwards he never brought it up again so I hope you could elaborate why there are such high stakes.
@46/deanfrobischer: A few months back there was a longer examination of Merope & Tom Sr. The original post itself has some flaws, but the discussion makes clear that you are definitely not alone in feeling the squick and recognizing that neither her gender nor her own abusive upbringing can justify her rape and abuse of him.
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@47/torrent56: “Why would his resentment continue…” Because his insecurities are overwhelming his sense of reason! Trust me, I’ve been there at his age. ;-) I find that his apparent inability to pick up on the clues that would de-escalate the tensions is an effective narrative approach to illustrate his immaturity.
I have no problem accepting that Fred’s, George’s, and Ron’s big-brother intentions to look out for Ginny are both expected and generally honorable. But the twins handle it in a deft and mature manner, while Ron compounds his misunderstanding of her situation by exhibiting little respect for either her privacy or her agency.
Apart from a bit of character development, the only significant plot consequence of the spat in this chapter is the Lavender-Ron thread, which plays little role in the orverarching plot. In contrast, the incident in DH touches on a couple more significant areas. Ron’s behavior comes close to undoing one of Ginny’s goals: to provide Harry with a moment and feeling to which he could retreat for comfort and strength in dark moments (which he most definitely ends up needing). But perhaps more important is what Emily points out in her analysis: Ron’s behavior is a manifestation of the insecurities that the locket horcrux willl later exploit to drive him away from Harry & Hermione. My point in bringing it up here is to note that the groundwork for that bit of foreshadowing in DH has roots in this chapter, nearly a full book before it becomes plot-critical.
@ian,
Ron’s insecurity – Why was he quite and silent when Hermione told him he is invited to the party then? I have been a boy at his age as well and I can’t see why he will definitely go down that path of blowing up again especially if he has a great time with Hermione at Slughorn’s party without a massive catalyst. I would accept it without any issues if that is how the romance develops and indeed like it much better than what happened in the actual book. But this is all speculation in our parts since we’re looking at what-if analysis.
The intentions – So we agree then most of the times the big brothers’ intentions are honourable isn’t it pretty normal for the twins, who have far more experience in this area than Ron at that time, to know what to do a lot better?
“Apart from a bit of character development, the only significant plot consequence of the spat in this chapter is the Lavender-Ron thread, which plays little role in the orverarching plot.”
All the more reason to axe it and spend more time dealing with the real plot rather than making everyone involved looks terrible then.
Foreshadowing – OK I understand you now thanks. I wouldn’t dispute that Ron rather badly misunderstood Harry and Ginny on Harry’s birthday there, but I am not sure why it’s such a big deal in the overall scheme of things especially as Harry supposedly had tonnes of happy time with Ginny in the previous book to draw on (and what Ginny provided is really more of the same as before even if you can argue it’s closer to the date of departure so arguably more effective). However, I would say the fact Ginny was in tears by the end does help to mislead him to a certain extent as to what was happening. Also I thought it’s rather clear based on the dialogues during the camping trip in DH his insecurity is only a part of his overall resentment as he gave plenty of other, more important reasons as to why he blew up in the end.
Honestly Harry’s insistence on everyone wearing the Horcrux in turn only made it clear his incompetence in leading the team, especially as it’s not the only time he made terrible mistakes for which his friends suffered the consequences for although for lots of people he get a free pass there as the protagonist.
@49/torrent56: I guess all I can say about Ron’s behavior here (and later) is that it is irrational…and irrational behavior is nearly impervious to ‘why?’ pretty much by definition. :-)
Methinks this may be circling back around to the problem of assessing the characters on their own vs. assessing them as elements of the story. I’m generally inclined towards the latter on general principles, but even a good-faith attempt at the former runs into a lot of dead-ends here because many bits of info that could resolve the questions and ambiguities are simply never addressed in the text.
I’ve felt for a while that HBP is less significant as a story on its own than it is as a prologue to DH. Rowling needed certain elements in place for the homestretch: conflict among the previously tight-knit Trio, Harry & Ginny connected but separated, a blurring of the previous bright lines between the Good and Bad Guys, a general sense of uncertainty and angst, etc. These middle chapters of HBP seem to be where that process is really kicking into high gear, with a healthy dash of plausible (and relatable) late-teenage irrationality serving as an effective vehicle for moving some of those pieces along. Of course, this all comes at the cost of taking the shine off of some characters and muddying the plot a bit. Your assessment of how well that works out will likely depend upon the degree you are looking for the narrative to ‘do right’ by the characters vs. having the characters being placed in service of the story.
@ian,
“is that it is irrational…and irrational behavior is nearly impervious to ‘why?’ pretty much by definition.”
Not exactly even irrational behaviours could have explanations like Ron’s blow-out here. If he is secure about himself the taunts wouldn’t have bothered him at all.
Can’t dispute with the fact we don’t have complete information although when the author says something that isn’t supported by the books it does make my eyes row.
“conflict among the previously tight-knit Trio”
Why is the conflict here worse than in book 3-5? At least in this book Harry didn’t have a fight with either of his friends.
“Harry & Ginny connected but separated”
I can see that Ginny is supposed to let Harry feel like a normal boy instead of the Chosen One. However I am not sure exactly what purpose is served here by the separation. In particular, note how illogical the break-up is as nobody knew about it and everybody would still assume Ginny is Harry’s girlfriend and regardless of whether they’re officially dating or not, they wouldn’t be seeing each other during the quest so the sacrifice isn’t really that.
“a blurring of the previous bright lines between the Good and Bad Guys”
Yeah that’s problematic when this blurring is never acknowledged. For instance, Harry started hexing people for fun (we already discussed it in an earlier thread), cheating in potions and disbanded the DA for more Quidditch yet we’re supposed to see him as much more mature than Ron or how he was a year ago? Right…
“a general sense of uncertainty and angst”
It’s only really for Ron and Hermione as Harry’s angst mainly consists of whether Ron will approve of him dating Ginny so forget about the fact he should have checked with the girl first if she’s still interested in him or that Ron was actually match-maker in OotP. And Ginny never had any angst at all.
I agree this book is supposed to serve as a prologue to DH so my assessment of this book is on how well it connects to DH and what amazes me is how irresponsible the hero is and the general theme of the book is “War, what war?”. This guy knew about the prophecy and the Horcruxes quest, and yet he is still relying on Hermione to do the research he should be doing and took no active steps whatsoever to become a better wizard. It looks pretty bad when the alternate hero Neville is more enthusiastic about continuing a club to improve one’s dueling skills than the hero. Another issue is how this book should have introduced or at least hinted at a lot of the gimmicks that we see in the last book.
@51/torrent56: The lack of more explicit exposition regarding the various characters’ states of mind that you describe strikes me as simply a book whose author followed the principles of Show Don’t Tell and Conservation of Detail. That writers and critics tend to see these as elements of ‘good’ writing doesn’t require you to like it, of course. But sometimes one must decide to like the book and actively work with the author to get there. I tend to handwave around these sorts of narrative gaps in ways that give the characters (and the author) the benefit of the doubt; but taking a more pessimistic approach can lead to some interesting interpretations too.
“If [Ron] is secure about himself the taunts wouldn’t have bothered him at all.” Yes, exactly! The author chose to show us his insecurities by having him (over)react inappropriately. It’s not that the resulting tensions are worse in HBP, but rather that they are never really resolved in this book and flare up again at inopportune moments in DH.
Regarding H/G’s separation, the flippant answer is that JKR always intended for circumstances to force them apart near the end. The literary answer is that separating the protagonist from his love interest is a common trope, useful for providing both motivation and conflict. The in-universe explanation is that Harry develops a nearly pathological need to keep her away from the dangers surrounding him, partly justified in DH by her still being subject to the Trace and also that his fully acknowledged feelings for her are likely to cloud his tactical judgement in any active fight that involved them both. Arguably, the latter attitude denies Ginny some agency in much the same way Ron does here in the corridor and later at the Burrow, although I think Harry’s concern is less about her competence than his sense of fairness.
Given his experiences in the previous two books, it is both ironic and somewhat incongruous that Harry seems so calm while his best friends start squabbling, his love life is in crisis, Hogwarts students are becoming increasingly antsy, and the wizarding world is sliding into war. In-universe, perhaps he is simply compartmentalizing out of necessity. However, a seemingly well-adjusted Harry focused on teenage rom-com hijinks does serve as a foil for a darkening world, as well as increasing the emotional impact when his life again goes to hell at the end of the book.
@ian,
“The lack of more explicit exposition regarding the various characters’ states of mind that you describe strikes me as simply a book whose author followed the principles of Show Don’t Tell and Conservation of Detail.”
Yes, normally we gave good characters the benefit of doubt in fiction when they do something questionable. However, in this case it just went too far especially with Harry.
Like I said before earlier but was ignored, I don’t think Ron’s insecurity is a major reason in his fight with Harry in the last book, as there are more important reasons in that specific circumstance.
“The in-universe explanation is that Harry develops a nearly pathological need to keep her away from the dangers surrounding him, partly justified in DH by her still being subject to the Trace and also that his fully acknowledged feelings for her are likely to cloud his tactical judgement in any active fight that involved them both.”
It doesn’t change the fact it’s irrational to say the least since the Death Eaters had no knowledge of the break-up and they are just as likely to target her as the Chosen One’s girlfriend than before. Even if they supposedly broke up, Harry really isn’t able to switch off feelings like a switch so any effects on his judgement is dubious at best. However, irrespective of the break-up, it’s obvious that Ginny going on the quest with the trio makes no sense because of the Trace and because two Weasley children being sick and on their deathbeds is just too suspicious.
“Given his experiences in the previous two books, it is both ironic and somewhat incongruous that Harry seems so calm while his best friends start squabbling, his love life is in crisis, Hogwarts students are becoming increasingly antsy, and the wizarding world is sliding into war.”
It’s amazing how carefree he is about that war. Does he understand outside Dumbledore’s lessons he had to confront a Dark Lord eventually? The only reason I can think of is that he thought Dumbledore will be there to take care of everything so he can just be a typical teenager forever. The foil with his friends is fine if it makes sense and doesn’t make the character unlikable.
I like Emily’s explanation here re: Merope. She felt betrayed by Tom, and while the rest of the world may not see it like that, that is what is true for her – To paraphrase Dumbledore “Of course it is in her head, but why on earth should that make it any less real?” Merope is painted as a very sympathetic character, and I do feel sorry for her and the life that she lead.
That being said, when speaking of drugging, kidnapping and repeated rape, you do need to separate the act from the person. Everyone knows abuse begets abuse, but that doesn’t mean we should allow the perpetuation of heinous acts like the one committed here. It was committed out of infatuation and obsession instead of malice or a desire to do harm, but that is merely an explanation, not a justification.
While I feel sorry for her, when it comes to her ‘relationship’ with Tom, there is a clear victim and perpetrator.