The Harry Potter Reread is looking forward to rocking a casbah of some sort. If only someone would invite it to rock a casbah.
This week we’re getting another dose of horrible reporting and taking an awesome bath. We’re on Chapters 24 and 25 of The Goblet of Fire—Rita Skeeter’s Scoop and The Egg and the Eye.
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 24—Rita Skeeter’s Scoop
Summary
Everyone is up late the next day and exhausted. Hermione’s hair is back to normal; she tells Harry that she used a special hair potion on it, but it would be too much trouble to do it every day. Ron and Hermione are being incredibly civil to each other following their argument. Ron doesn’t even argue with her when he tells her what they found out about Hagrid and she claims that giants couldn’t be as bad as the wizarding world makes them seem.
Harry is trying to work out the golden egg clue, but he’s determined not to use Cedric hint because he’s feeling unfavorable toward him now that he’s dating Cho. The second term starts up, and when they make their way to Care of Magical Creatures, the trio are shocked to find a new teacher—Professor Grubbly-Plank, who give them a lesson in unicorns. She is taking over because Hagrid is unable to teach, and they soon find out why; Rita Skeeter has written an article on him.
The article claims that Hagrid terrifies the students, and talks about his Blast Ended-Skrewts (as their creation is not being monitored by the Ministry as it normally would be). Draco gave a quote to the article detailing his hippogriff injury from the previous year. The article also reveals Hagrid’s half-giant heritage and insists that this is responsible for his brutal nature. Draco is hoping that the article will prevent Hagrid from being able to teach ever again—and it doesn’t help that all the students seem to like Professor Grubbly-Plank’s class much better. Parvati has no problem saying so, and doesn’t care much what Harry thinks of it after how he treated her at the ball.
It doesn’t make sense to the trio that Skeeter would have heard Hagrid’s admission about being half-giant, and they try to think of ways she might have snuck onto the school grounds; Harry wonders about an Invisibility Cloak. He insists they go visit Hagrid and tell him they want him back and professor. But he won’t see them, or anyone for that matter.
A Hogsmeade trip comes up and Hermione is surprised Harry is going since she’d figured he’d want to work on the egg—he lies and tells her he’s got it mostly figured so he can search Hogsmeade for Hagrid. As they’re leaving for the trip, Krum dives into the freezing lake in naught but his swim trunks. Ron makes it sound like he hopes Krum drowns, and Hermione tries to suggest that he’s not that bad. (She doesn’t know that Ron has snapped his action figure of the guy into pieces.) They don’t find Hagrid in Hogsmeade, but they do spot Ludo Bagman at the Three Broomsticks being menaced by a group of goblins. Bagman asks for a word with Harry in private.
He tells Harry that the goblins are looking for Barty Crouch Sr.; he hasn’t been coming into work at all, though they want to keep that on the down low in case Rita Skeeter tries to run a crazy story. Again, Bagman offers to help Harry with the Tournament, claiming he’s taken a liking to him and that everyone wants a Hogwarts champion. Harry smoothly asks if Bagman has offered the same help to Cedric (which of course he hasn’t). Harry declines the offer, and Bagman beats a hasty retreat when Fred and George show up and offer to buy him a drink. Harry tells Ron and Hermione what that was all about, but Hermione is perplexed by why the goblins would need to talk to Crouch at all. Harry figures that it might be due to Crouch’s ability to interpret, but Hermione points out that goblins are quite capable of handling wizards, unlike certain house-elves she could name.
Rita Skeeter enters The Three Broomsticks, and Harry can’t help himself; he calls her out for what she did to Hagrid in front of the entire bar. When Rita asks Harry to give an interview on Hagrid himself, Hermione starts in on her. Skeeter tries to shut her up, but Hermione’s not having it. The trio storm out of the pub and Hermione leads them back to the grounds and Hagrid’s cabin. She pounds on the door for him to open up—but Dumbledore is the one who answers. He lets them in where they find Hagrid sitting at his table, a complete wreck. They work together to insist that Hagrid is still loved by many; Dumbledore informs him of the owls he’s gotten from former students who want assurances that he’ll keep his job, Harry points out that he’s the one with real monstrous relatives, which leads Albus to mention his own brother’s run-in with the law for practicing inappropriate charms on a goat….
Dumbledore tells Hagrid that he won’t accept a resignation and expects him back to work next week, then leaves. Hagrid shows the trio a picture of his dad and talks about him. Then he says he’s done with Madame Maxime (without mentioning her by name) and her denial over her stature. He tells Harry that he was reminded of himself when they met again just a few years back, that he wants Harry to win the Triwizard Tournament, to prove that you didn’t have to be a pureblood to have incredible worth, and prove that Dumbledore was right letting anyone study at Hogwarts. He asks Harry how he’s getting on with the egg, and Harry lies and says he’s doing well. But it’s Hagrid happiness that convinces Harry to get over himself and try Cedric’s hint.
Commentary
Ron and Hermione are coping with their fight by basically pretending nothing is wrong. It makes a helluva lot of sense here; by having that fight at all, they have both implied that they care for each other much more then either of them is ready to admit. The safest thing they can do is sweep it under the rug for now.
The article on Hagrid finally hits, and it ends up worse than we were led to believe. We get our first solid hint that something is off about Rita’s reporting methods when Harry suggests she may have a cloak of her own, but it’s not really enough to give her away. She reports on the skrewts as though they’re a highly illegal project, when we know they aren’t. It’s another scenario where the Triwizard Tournament creates an awkward catch-22; Hagrid can’t explain why he’s really breeding the skrewts because the champions themselves can’t know they’re for the tournament (though the Hogwarts kids really do already have an unfair advantage with them). But that’s nothing compared to the revelation that he’s half-giant, and it doesn’t help that Skeeter naturally misrepresents giants as a whole species. She insists that they mostly killed themselves off due to infighting before the aurors took the rest of them down, which is simply untrue as far as I understand it.
It’s devastating because Hagrid essentially outs himself to one person he’s hoping to trust (Maxime), only to get shot down. Then he’s outed without his permission to everyone. You have to figure that this has been one of Hagrid’s greatest fears basically forever, and now it’s finally come true and he’s sure that it means the end of everything he cares about. (Because getting expelled after becoming an orphan wasn’t enough.) Adding insult to injury, it’s pretty clear that Grubbly-Plank is better at teaching kids safely. Hermione can’t help but say so, even if she’d never say it to Hagrid’s face.
Ludo Bagman is at it again, and this time he’s pissing off some goblins. We won’t find out until later that this is actually his second run-in with them after they cleaned him out at the World Cup. He’s clever enough to try and push the whole incident off with a story about Crouch—which works on Harry, since it is circumspect that he’s been AWOL from work. We can to assume that this is a tactic Bagman employs all the time, distracting people from his misdeeds by bringing up other odd goings-on and sidling away. He’s a coward and a hack, but he’s smart in how he cheats people.
I love that Harry and Hermione tell Rita off, mostly because there’s that righteous streak that the two of them share, and it’s so much fun when it runs in tandem. Bad in the long run, but watching someone tear her down has been a long time coming (and we’ve only known her for a few chapters, that’s how awful she is). Then they book it back to Hagrid’s hut to force him to talk and we get one of my favorite Dumbledore bits in the entire series, from his insistence to Harry that he’s gone “temporarily deaf,” allowing the boy to say what he likes a bout Rita Skeeter to his bad analogy regarding his brother Aberforth and his “inappropriate” charm on goats. According to Rowling, the charm in question was designed to keep their “horns curly and clean.” And yes, that’s supposed to work on more than one level, so we can all sort of balk at that and ask W-T-ever-loving-F ABERFORTH without feeling like we’re the creepy ones.
I’m just gonna let that one sit with you for a while.
But the central message here is that Hagrid is so incredibly loved. We find out about the many former students who support him, we know that Dumbledore loves him. And Albus gives a very important piece of advice here for Hagrid, Harry, and anyone who’s ever been brought down by public opinion; that universal popularity is not something anyone can or should aspire to. The people who matter in Hagrid’s life take no issue with his heritage because he means far more to them than labels and BS stereotypes.
Hagrid takes Dumbledore’s words to heart and starts pulling himself together. And then he has to go and break our hearts by telling Harry that he wants him to win—not just because he loves the kid, or he wants Hogwarts to get the glory. But because Harry winning, an orphan and half-blood like him, that would mean something far greater. That would show all the Malfoys and Skeeters and Ministry cronies of the world that people like them should never be cast off and shunned. It would prove that people like them had worth.
It’s not a perfect analogy; Harry has many privileges in his life that Hagrid has never been blessed with. But it matters because Hagrid believes it. And that means something to Harry. It’s exactly what he needs needs to hear to get his head in the game. We can talk all we want about how Hermione keeps the trio alive in these books, and it’s true. But this, moments like these are what make Harry special—logic doesn’t really motivate him most of the time. But people do. People always do.
The Second Task didn’t matter enough to Harry because he’s not doing the Triwizard Tournament for himself; it’s just this looming, life-threatening behemoth that he never signed up for. But he can do it for Hagrid.
Chapter 25—The Egg and the Eye
Summary
Harry uses the Invisibility Cloak and Marauder’s Map to get him into the Prefect’s bathroom in the middle of the night, so he won’t be disturbed. He finds a magical bathroom full of taps that shoot a myriad of bubble baths and scents, along with a pool-sized tub. He doesn’t come up with anything clever about the egg, though. That’s when Moaning Myrtle appears and tells him to put the egg in the water, like Cedric did. Harry is understandably distressed to know that Myrtle has probably seen him (and all the other prefects of the past several generations) naked.
He opens the egg in the water and it plays a song telling him that he’ll have to go under water to recover something that these underwater folk will take from him. He figures out that it’s merpeople with Myrtle egging him on (and going on about stalking her fellow classmate). Harry gets out of the bath, wondering how he’s going to breathe underwater for such a long period of time, and what they will take from him. He leaves the bathroom, but notices something odd on the Marauder’s Map—Bartemius Crouch is lurking in Professor Snape’s office. Harry makes for Snape’s office to find out what Crouch is up to, but he hits the trick step on the staircase, drops the egg and the map, and the racket calls Filch to the scene. Harry’s hidden under the cloak so Filch thinks Peeves has stolen the egg. He’s about to discover the unwiped map with Harry plainly on it, but he stop when Snape shows up; someone broke into his office.
Filch wants to go after Peeves, but Snape insists that he come and find whoever broke into his office. It’s then that Moody shows up on the scene—and he can see Harry there. He makes a point of implying that Snape could hiding all sorts of things in his office, talking of how Dumbledore had given him permission to keep an eye on Snape, which roundly infuriates the guy. The Potions professor makes a point of clutching his arm when Moody get particularly accusatory. Then Mad-Eye tells Snape that he’s dropped something, meaning the map. Harry knows he can’t let Snape have it, so he waves to Moody under the cloak to let him know that the parchment belongs to him. Moody summons the map to himself and claims it was his all along, but Snape recognizes it, puts everything together, and figures that Harry is out there under the cloak. Moody only stops him by suggesting that Snape’s mind going directly to Harry is suspicious when someone is clearly gunning for the kid.
Snape elects to go to bed and Moody demands the egg from Filch. Once they’re gone, Moody goes to Harry gets a better look at the Marauder’s Map. He’s fascinated by it, and asks Harry if he saw the man who broke into Snape’s office. Harry tells him it was Barty Crouch, and asks Moody why he would be there. Moody tells him that Crouch is even more obsessed with catching dark wizards than he is, which leads to Harry voicing his concerns over what’s been going on with the Death Eaters, the Dark Mark. Moody tells Harry he’s a sharp kid, and asks if he can borrow the map for a while, which Harry agrees to. He then tells Harry that’s he’d make a great Auror before heading off to bed, and Harry thinks about the possibility… though he decides that he’d like to know how more of them are doing later in life before making that career move.
Commentary
The prefect’s bathroom is a magical fairy land of joyfulness, and they should really tell all the other students how awesome it is because then everyone would work so hard to become a prefect. Is this a co-ed bathroom, though? We’re never given an indication that there’s more than one. Even so, they’re sharing this giant fancy spa room with practically no one. (There are only about 24 prefects in the school at any given time, and Quidditch captains are allowed to use the bathroom too.) So cool. I wonder what other sorts of secret privileges that prefects and Head Girl/Boy get.
Aaaaaand there’s Myrtle. Perving on naked Harry. Yeah, this part is super creepy, especially when you consider that Myrtle has likely been doing this for decades, with generations of prefects. Of course, it’s hard to be surprised after a little considering—what did we think Myrtle got up to all day, every day? Of course, she does admit that for a long time the answer was stalk the girl who gave me a hard time at school while I was alive so everything’s still creepy. Just getting creepier.
Theories on why water effects Myrtle? She claims that sometimes she ends up in the lake when someone flushes the toilet before she notices, but that would indicate that the current of sewage had any bearing on a ghost at all. She’s probably just making it up, but it’s funny to think about anyway.
Harry finds Bartemius Crouch on the map, and he just can’t leave well-enough alone, so he goes to investigate… and of course puts himself in the actual worst possible scenario outside of having a run in with Voldemort. This is the second book in a row where Harry has gotten caught in an after-hours situation like this, but I have to give Rowling credit for how much she ups the ante on this one—it’s far more fraught than last time, especially because Harry doesn’t get time to wipe the map.
It’s interesting that the Marauder’s Map doesn’t register the difference between senior and junior and the like. It seems as though it was “programmed” not to bother noting the difference between those with the same names, which makes sense to a larger extent. If you just happen two have to students at the school named “Chester Wodehouse,” the map wouldn’t bother to label them #1 and #2 or anything like that. So adding on Sr. or Jr. is viewed as similarly superfluous.
Either way, this gorgeously tense scene all hinges on that single error. There are so many things that can go wrong here. It’s also easy to forget when you’re rereading that between now and the Yule Ball, these are the first hints we really get of Snape being a former Death Eater. And because we don’t have the whole story, that possibility is meant to be far more sinister. So we’ve got Filch just making everything worse by being there, and Snape and Moody snapping at each other’s heels, and Moody is playing Snape pretty darn well. Only it’s not Moody, it’s Barty Crouch Jr., and everything is coming up sunshine and daffodils for this guy because if Harry hadn’t dropped the map or if Barty hadn’t gotten his hands on it following Harry’s warning, a very different conversation would have taken place. And the book would have basically ended here.
So it’s tense on your first read, but on a reread this hurts like burning. Because Barty came so damn close to being caught. Inches, millimeters away. If anyone else had put their hands on the Marauder’s Map during this scene, it would have been over. And Barty Crouch knows this, so he weaves a perfect little story for Harry, making him suspect Snape and putting Moody beyond suspicion. (It’s important to note that this just happened to Harry last chapter with Bagman—adults are are lying left and right to him this year. And that only leads to further damage in the “trusting your elders” department.)
Can’t help but love the perfect irony that the first person who tells Harry Potter that he should be an auror is a damned Death Eater. Grown up Harry probably looks back on this conversation and chuckles to himself now and then.
Emmet Asher-Perrin forgot how much Hagrid made her cry in this chapter. You can bug her on Twitter and Tumblr, and read more of her work here and elsewhere.
Well, Barty Jr is the best DA teacher they’ve had. Well, tied with Lupin, anyway. Probably one of the better teachers there, too.
Hadn’t even considered what happened to Hagrid in the sense of “outing” as being lgbt “outing”, but that is what it is.
Rowling did a masterful job of writing Moody in such a way as to make Harry (and the reader) trust him while at the same time being consistent with the eventual twist that he’s really Crouch Jr. I think that when I got to the twist I stopped reading and immediately went back to reread all the scenes with Moody to figure out how I’d missed it. This scene is a great example. The clue is RIGHT THERE and it slips right by.
My favorite misdirection here is Snape accusing Harry of taking polyjuice ingredients from his storeroom. Harry thinks it’s odd that he’s still on Harry for what he did in his second year (but it tracks due to his characterization of not being able to let things go), yet snapes talking about fake moody taking his supplies right under his nose the whole time!
It’s kind of funny to hear about Moody!Crouch mentioning that Crouch (Sr.) is even more obsessed with catching dark wizards than he is, becuase it’s true, and it’s implied elsewhere that part of Crouch Sr.’s fanatacism/rigidity may have been responsible for him not realizing what was going on in his own home.
I actually kind of hate the staircase scene becuase it stretches my belief that Harry would have gotten away, that everybody would show up at the right minute and Snape would be foiled yet again. But, I tend to dislike those kinds of tense scenes in movies/books. Also, for whatever reason, I’m reminded of the obsessive teacher in Fairly Odd Parents who is never able to prove fairies exist, lol.
I can’t help but feel a bit sorry for Myrtle and her existence and the fact that she will never be able to move on.
I always wondered about the co-ed bathroom set up. I am sure this has lead to hundreds of fan fics
Hagrid may be beloved, but the truth is that he’s not a very good teacher.
I like that this little moment with Krum in his swim trunks demonstrates that he has learned the clue.
According to Rowling, the charm in question was designed to keep their “horns curly and clean.”
OK, this is played for snickers at the moment, but when we learn in DH, that Aberforth used tending the goats to keep Ariana calm, and that emotional connection is likely why his Patronus is a goat(though his stubborn nature could be indicated), this is kinda sad. Did he want to keep their horns curly and clean because she liked them best that way?
@2, Nick31, I did the same thing when we learn about the Taboo in DH. I called bullshit, because for six books Harry has been dedicated to calling him by his name, so I couldn’t believe that for SO MANY chapters Harry never used it. But that is the case, even after Ron left, they held to his request to not say the name. It was only when Ron came back that he did use it.
@5 Hagrid actually is a good teacher, in that he is extremely knowledgable in his subject. He’s had a horrible teaching experience. His first lesson was great but was screwed up by Malfoy failing to follow instructions in regards to dealing with hippogriffs. There are two issues with his teaching. Firstly, he likes dangerous creatures and second, he’s easily flustered, which is why he’s not a quality teacher. But then, who would be? How would Grubbly-Plank handle the incessant bigotry Malfoy gives to Hagrid? We never see him in other classes, though Luna offers a nasty opinion shared by her fellow Ravenclaws, who seem to suffer from a bit of a superiority complex(look at how they treat Luna).
Krum swimming in the winter lake reminds me of my college friends in Maine swimming year-round in the always-frigid ocean. I now know that he was probably practicing the shark-head spell, not swimming for fun, but it’s still almost as endearing as it was when I didn’t know that.
So there are two prefects in each house in each grade for fifth, sixth, and seventh-years? If one of them becomes Head Boy/Girl in seventh year, is another seventh year chosen to replace them?
I’m guessing it would be pretty easy to put a spell on the door of the bathroom that would only allow students of a single sex through, unless it was empty, in a similar way to the stairs to the girls dorms that don’t allow boys.
That’s my idea anyway and I’m sticking to it, even if it doesn’t explain how Harry and Ron can get into the girls bathroom in CoS.
It’s a single use bathroom. If it’s occupied, no entry, regardless if they know the password.
Aberforth was an awesome character once we finally met him, but from the beginning I had some serious issues with him, all stemming from his unexplained goat shenanigans. That’s just really disturbing.
There are so many things in these books that I wish were real, from flying broomsticks to chocolate frogs to polyjuice potion, but I think that the Prefects’ bathroom is right near the top of the list for me. It sounds AMAZING!
@@@@@ 6 – Being extremely knowledgeable in your subject doesn’t make you a good teacher. cf Severus Snape. It’s entirely possible that Hagrid is a good teacher, but I never recall actually seeing him be one. Letting Harry near Buckbeak before telling him what to do if Buckbeak doesn’t bow – not exactly safe. The bonfire full of salamanders – fun, but how much do they learn beyond “salamanders like fire”, which isn’t exactly a complex message? The flobberworms – oh ye gods. The nifflers – that’s how to *use* magical creatures in a thinly-disguised gambling environment, not how to care for them.
Emily – is it ever actually confirmed that Rita’s wrong in saying the Skrewts are illegal? It’s not as if Hagrid’s not got form for keeping illegal creatures at Hogwarts. The fact that he uses one in the last task could be a case of “Hagrid, do you by any chance have any dangerous creatures lying around that aren’t protected by any laws or treaties and so can be killed by Champions without causing a massive pile of paperwork to appear on my desk? Thought you might.”
Hagrid’s story was probably the saddest thing in this chapter. It’s not just that he’s an orphan like Harry. It’s that for his entire life basically he’s been looking for a place for himself, both with his job (which he’s not very good at) and with his half-giant status (which the only person he thought he could trust with wants to ignore completely), and that what happened to him with the chamber of secrets has plagued him his whole life and prevents him from starting over anywhere else. It is really easy to see why he is so loyal to Dumbledore, since he really doesn’t have anyone else to care for him.
In this vein, I have always wondered what Madame Maxine’s story was. She seems to be very well respected at her school. Is it because of a cultural thing (is France more accepting of half-giants) or did her wizarding parent have more status/wealth in society, that she has managed to rise so high?
I never thought that Aberforth actually did anything like *that* to the goats. I imagined that he was caught practising weird charms on the goat, and the rumours (probably helped out by people by Rita Skeeter) made it out to be much worse than it actually was.
I’m mostly horrified by the implication that Hogwarts flushes all its sewage (untreated?!) out into the lake. No wonder the merpeople are unfriendly.
@12, Hagrid was excellent in his previous job, Keeper of Keys and Gamemaster of Hogwarts.
@11, I know that, which is why I pointed out the ways in which he is not a good teacher, in that he doesn’t have the temperment for it. Yet, he’s still head and shoulders above Snape.
I like that this little moment with Krum in his swim trunks demonstrates that he has learned the clue.
Headslap
@13 – Word!
Also, was Hagrid ever officially cleared of what happened in the Chamber? Honestly, it kind of seems like there should be some recourse for him to finish up his education (although perhaps he’s totally fine where he is, now).
@16, Yes, he was cleared that’s why he was eligible for the teaching post.
@14 Aeryl
Literally!
@18, Heh
Why Hagrid is not a good teacher:
1. Hagrid loves magical creatures so much that he doesn’t notice how dangerous they are. He thought a dragon would make a good pet!
2. He doesn’t anticipate how his students think. It didn’t occur to him that they wouldn’t know how to handle the Monster Book of Monsters, or that they weren’t all paying attention to his hippogriff safety lecture.
On the other hand, he’s very far from being the worst teacher at Hogwarts- apart from Snape, there are a number of instructors who are useless- Binns, Trelawney, half the Dark Arts professors…
@14: I meant his job as a teacher. Being gamekeeper is great and all, but it doesn’t even put him in much contact with other people. Even Hagrid said that he always wanted to be a teacher more than anything, probably because it actually earned him a place working *with* people. (As in helping them, and watching them grow, not in chasing them out of the Forbidden Forest).
Outing Barty Jr. at the critical point would have made no difference.
This is proven by Trelawny’s prophecy about Pettigrew.
This series is about Fate. Thus, Fate would have arranged the
same meeting of Harry, Pettigrew, and Voldemort as the one
that did happen.
@22: Not necessarily. Not all prophecies have to come true. Dumbledore makes the point in OotP that many prophecies in the Department of Mysteries remain unfulfilled. He also reminds Harry that the main reason Harry wants to fight Voldemort is because he wants Voldemort dead. Not because the prophecy makes him want to fight Voldemore.
I love how casual Albus is about his brother’s habits. Yes, my brother got outed for engaging in inappropiate activities with goats, but it never bothered him in the slightest! Granted, maybe being gay and learning to try and tolerate other races has led him to become somewhat more accepting of his brothers practices. But it still seems a bit odd.
I wonder if Harry ever asked more about this. And what his reaction was if he found out.
Both Harry’s parents are wizards (even though one is muggleborn), and he’s competing against a quarter Veela. Harry’s not really the symbol for half-blood everywhere here.
“with Myrtle egging him on”
… No, nothing to comment here.
Harry is punished for breaking the curfew in the first book, he narrowly escapes being caught when he goes to Hogsmeade in the third, and of course getting caught by Umbridge in the fifth year. But in this particular case, what’s the problem with being out after hours? Apart from Snape, no faculty is going to give him a hard time for that, as Harry is (one of) the Hogwart’s champion, especially since he’s not abusing his status here, he went out for getting a clue for the next task. So even if Snape does cause him troubles, Harry will have no problem getting out without any consequence by appealing to anyone with more authority (so basically, McGonagall). And Snape didn’t actually try to kill Harry for the past three years (he stopped at torture), so there’s no reason that would change before Voldemort’s return. Is it about losing the map? He gives it to “Moody” anyway, and Snape already knows about it, and probably what it does. Maybe I should reread the part, because I fail to see where is the tension here (from a first read point of view, it’s obviously very different once we know about Croutch), except that it’s told from the point of view of a teenager.
@24: since there are no openly gay characters in those books (that I know of, I may have missed a minor one; and by openly I mean: not Dumbledore), we don’t know whether wizards have prejudices about that. The fact that many of them are intolerant about other species, Muggles and Muggleborns doesn’t mean they’re homophobic too.
I had heard much good about Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, but it isn’t until it was recommended here that I actually read it. I just finished what’s been published so far, just in time for the big reveal. So thanks to the person who mentioned it.
The champions aren’t supposed to help one another either. So he’d have to explain how he got into the prefect’s bathroom, perhaps getting Cedric in trouble. He’d have to explain how he came to possess a piece of confiscated contraband. And McGonagall is a STICKLER for rules and playing fair. She doesn’t care to abide by rule breaking, even in service to the Quidditch & House Cups. The closest she comes is forgoing assigning homework, and allowing Harry space to train for the maze(which is more about protecting his life, he could easily die in the maze, where failing to decipher the egg would just humiliate him). She would not care that Harry was doing what he did in service to the Triwizard Tournament, he’d have had better luck with that if Sprout or Flitwick or even Snape* were his head of house. This I think is Harry’s only year where he doesn’t get detention, which is good because he can ill afford to lose time needed to prepare for the tasks.
*Here’s a thought. How would Snape have acted toward Harry had Harry actually agreed to be placed in Slytherin?
@Athreeren.
I think the implication has always been that Dumbledore’s homosexuality helped to encourage a more accepting view of people, hence why he tends to be less prejudiced against werewolves, giants, and such.
Also, I doubt Snape would have just let Harry go. Egg or not, he was clearly breaking the rules. In fact, there wasn’t really a need to go out late since Harry could probably find some other way of submerging it in water. Cedric probably told him to use the prefects bathroom so that he could see how awesome it is.
Plus, Snape is spiteful enough that he’d certainly punish Harry anyway, even if there was a chance another professor might overturn his ruling.
@@@@@ 26 – Slytherin!Harry is a major genre within HP fanfic. Whether Snape is nice to Harry or not as a result of this varies a lot.
@@@@@ 25 – If Snape had got the Map, he’d have seen “Moody” labelled as “Bartemius Crouch”. Which would have changed the course of Wizarding history (on the basis that every “what if” changes history, at least to some degree).
@27,
Cedric probably told him to use the prefects bathroom so that he could see how awesome it is.
No, Cedric wanted Harry to see the mermaid.
@20 Relevant to terrible Hogwarts teachers, I’ve always wondered why Dumbledore let Binns go on teaching History of Magic. History is the subject in which you are most likely to recognize patterns of abuse and oppression against particular groups, if it’s taught by a competent teacher. Since Dumbledore obviously believes that muggles, non-purebloods, goblins, etc. have been historically mistreated by wizards, why doesn’t he hire somebody who can make the subject interesting and actually teach the kids something? Seems like having this base of knowledge would actually make purebloods more sympathetic to his cause and less willing to ally with Voldemort.
@30, I think Dumbledore is a) consumed with preparing for the upcoming battle against Voldemort and b) overvalues self driven education* because of his own childhood scholarship. Kinda like how some homeschool parents who turn out doctors and stuff become convinced that homeschooling is THE BEST for everybody, when it’s actually been shown to be as effected by things like parental education and income levels, just like public schooling.
I mean, let’s all recall, no matter how great a wizard he is, Rowling tells us stuff about people with their names and “Dumb” is right in there.
*For example, Draco in HBP. We’ve observed how freewheeling DD is with Harry, allowing him to pursue Voldemort in his own way from his arrival in Hogwarts. Pay attention to how he monitors Draco. While Snape was never able to learn what Draco had planned, Harry DID figure it out, and when he tells DD, DD’s plan is to do what he’s done with Harry for six years. See how it plays out.
@31, Harry didn’t figure out the vanishing cabinet did he? He was never in the room of lost things except to hide the book. He knew Draco in general was trying to kill DD, but DD already knew that from Snape.
No, but he knew it hinged on the storeroom in the RoR, because that’s the room Trelawney was trying to get into. DD could have taken it into consideration and told the order to patrol the 7th floor hallway. He knew Drago was attempting to smuggle in DEs and Harry told him Drago was celebrating.
We’ll go more into this at the time(especially DDs hubris here, as he becomes more concerned about Harry’s implications about him than ensuring the school IS protected), but even his reaction during the confrontation, reminds Harry of a teacher discussing a class project.
To me, this is an indication of his attitude towards teaching. Especially with his ace in the hole with Snape to cover the endgame.
I’ve always found it very telling that the only people who ever describe Hogwarts as a good school, let alone the best magical school in Europe/the world, are people who are about to go there, who are currently there, and its alumni. All people who are victims of its *incredibly worrying* teaching practices and lack of pastoral care. What have they got to compare it with?! The TriWizard Tournament only compares individual students. The public exam system is unlikely to be comparable, given that OWLs and NEWTs are not-remotely-disguised GCSEs and A Levels of the format that was around in the 90s, which while found all over the world are not common on the Continent. And Harry gets the equivalent of a B in “GCSE” potions without apparently knowing *anything* about potions, if what we see of him in HBP is anything to go by. Or indeed knowing what the grading system is until he starts the exam course.
I think Dumbledore is an *incredibly bad headmaster*. He oversaw the education of about two generations of wizards who either went evil or sat back and watched other people go evil and didn’t do anything about it. If that’s not an indictment of Dumbledore I don’t know what it is.
And no wonder the England quidditch team got flattened in an early round of the World Cup if only about 28 people a year get a decent amount of practice in it at the only school in England likely to have decent facilities or people who can afford brooms, there’s no teacher coaching those 28, and the 28s overlap across up to 6 years on a regular basis. Though I suppose that apart from sitting down sports, rugby and (from about 2005 – 2013) cricket, England players humiliate themselves in international sport even when they do get good training and mass participation…
To any Kiwis reading this, I’m sorry we didn’t give the Black Caps a good match the other day. We basically just wasted your time.
So he’d have to explain how he got into the prefect’s bathroom, perhaps getting Cedric in trouble.
Harry isn’t near the prefects’ bathroom any more because he went to investigate Crouch in Snape’s office.
This I think is Harry’s only year where he doesn’t get detention, which is good because he can ill afford to lose time needed to prepare for the tasks.
Harry and Ron did get detention from Snape when they defended Hermione in the teeth growing incident.
@birgit Hes still damp
@Aeryl Yeah, but how long has he been headmaster? He’s had decades to correct this obvious deficiency. Possibly he feels awkward about firing Binns, who has apparently been there for a very long time? It just seems that having a competent History of Magic professor would be extremely beneficial to both Dumbledore and every Hogwarts student. They have some serious issues to in their relations with non-wizards, and it would be better if the students could stay awake to hear about them. It’s like living in the US and not really understanding the Civil War. Just a bad idea.
@36: Damp and smelling of perfumed bath bubbles.
Now I wonder: where do non-prefects bathe/shower, exactly? Except for Oliver being “still in the showers” long after that PoA Quidditch game, I don’t recall any references to said ablutions.
Yeah, but Quidditch captains get to use the prefect bathroom.
But there’s gotta be somewhere. There are bathrooms all over the place-maybe they have showers, too?
With all the old-fashioned stuff in the castle, I bet the dorm rooms have washbasins in them for small personal needs like face washing.
Straight up guess work, but I’d imagine most students use communal facilities, maybe divided by House. That’d make the prefects’ more private facilities all the more a luxury/reward.
Actually, this makes me wonder something: is it possible that magic might eliminate the need for at least some personal hygiene? It seems like you might be able to just magic dirt off your body. Not as enjoyable as a nice bath or shower, perhaps, but could be functional.
@40 when the RoR becomes student housing in DH it adds washrooms, but only AFTER the girls show up.
In addition to being occupied with the war Dumbledore also already has one position he has to fill annually. Perhaps the poool of candidates is so small because he has to keep replacing DADA teachers that he can’t replace Binns.
I keep getting email alerts for this thread, but nothing extra shows up: am I just getting here too late to see the spam?
For Binns – I was always kind of under the impression that you couldn’t get rid of him? I know we may think of pushing the class to a different room and hiring someone else, but for all we know, Binns would simply show up to teach there…
@44, Well Myrtle states the Ministry forced her to stop doing what she wanted to do with her post life noncorporeal activities, so I imagine if it was a real priority for DD he’d do it.
Maybe I’m too tired to really think, but what did moody/junior mean when he was all “very interesting” about harry seeing his name on the map. Like was he just playing it cool as usual or did he acctually find it that interesting?
I think he’s playing it cool and realizing that the Map is one of the few things that can see through his disguise (which, perhaps he does find interesting)…which is partially why he makes sure to get it from Harry.
@40: When the Trio are on the run in DH there must be whole long stretches of time when getting anywhere near any kind of bathroom would be impossible. For some purposes, one can go behind a bush; for others, there is magical cleansing or there is an odour powerful enough to attract every Death Eater within miles.
Which has always bothered me about Nancy Drew, James Bond etc as well, given they don’t have access to alternative ablutions!
Way late, again, as per usual for me.
Muswell @@@@@ 11 – No, being knowledgeable is not, in and of itself, enough to make a good teacher (cf. Severus Snape). However, and I can’t remember if it’s in this book or OotP, but we see Hagrid take over a lesson on unicorns that Professor G-P had been teaching in his absence, and do a really good job with it. He was doing a decent job in the class about thestrals in OotP, until Umbridge showed up. As Aeryl said @@@@@6, his problem is lack of confidence, and being easily rattled, with a dash of over enthusiasm and a hint of preference for more dangerous creatures.
And I love the what-ifs of what would have happened if Snape had seen Barty’s name on the map. Any misdeeds by Harry in that instance would have gone right out the window.
File this as a What An Idiot moment for Snape.
-Snape notices an odd item. He has a burning hate for Potter, son of Potter, and knows that Lupin would have given him the Marauder’s Map.
-YOU’D EXPECT: Snape to immediately say “Accio Map”, which would confirm the odd item as the Marauder’s Map and get it to him in one fell swoop. Interestingly, Snape would make his next spell a Stupefy at his target, because he’d bust not Harry, but the Moody-disguised Bartemius Crouch Jr., with the Map being concrete evidence to show to Dumbledore. Checkmate, Bartemius Crouch Jr. Additionally, once the dust settles, he could mention how he knows Dumbledore would reward Harry for investigating, and use that as an excuse to dock 50 points from Gryffindor.
-INSTEAD: Snape just jumps for it, allowing “Moody” to beat him to the punch. It’s interesting how this one instance of Snape being passive about his rage about James Potter allowed for the second wizarding war to claim more lives, even if Sirius Black and Remus Lupin were among the casualties.