Harry Potter & The Half Blood Prince: Some thoughts and reactions
I first read HBP shortly after it was released. Most of the following was written at that time, but I never got around to posting it. Having recently (re)read the entire series in preparation for the upcoming release of Deathly Hollows, I thought that now would be a good time to post this.
Some things have been added and some removed with my re-read. For one thing, I can now say that I've read all of the first six books. I only read Sorcerer's Stone and Chamber of Secrets just last month. Can't say I'm sorry I waited that long. For another, things that really really annoyed me on first read-through didn't annoy me nearly as much on the second go-round. Other things, which my brain had happily skipped right over the first time, just hit me wrong this time. And, after reading more message boards and LJ posts than I usually bother to pay any attention to with theories galore for the last book, I simply have to offer up my responses to some of the craziness. Because this is extraordinarily long, it's behind a series of cuts.
General Reaction
I thought this was a competent if not altogether inspired book. The quality of the writing itself was actually better than I’ve come to expect from Rowling. It was the story that often failed to click for me. Typically, I've had the opposite issue with her books. The stories were engaging, and the characters compelling enough that I overlooked the mediocre writing. In fact, it was what I felt was poor writing that kept me from reading the first two books for such a long time.
I'd picked up Sorcerer's Stone after the movie came out and really tried to read it. I never made it more than ten or fifteen pages in. This year, I forced myself through it, but I still didn't enjoy it or Chamber of Secrets nearly as much as I have the other four books.
Overall, HBP felt unfinished. I didn’t expect it to wrap all the conclusions up with a nice neat little ribbon, but there was an unusual amount of unfinished business. I never felt closure. Dumbledore’s funeral, I think, was supposed to provide that, but it failed spectacularly in my mind.
There were good points to the book. It had a compelling mystery. There was the question of what Draco was up to. Snape’s loyalty was, as always, in play. I had the former figured out for certain after Ron’s poisoning (though that was probably at least partly due to the influence of morons who posted spoilers in subject lines in the first couple days after the book was released), and I have never seriously doubted the latter. Still, they were genuine mysteries for some. And there were other smaller mysteries that I found even more compelling. What was the mysterious item in Borgin and Burkes and of course who was the Half-blood Prince. I might have had that one figured out a little early, but not right away, not for sure.
I enjoyed the amount of background information in the book. I’m a complete backstory whore, so it was a great thing for me. The background on Snape was excellent. His half-blood heritage, the fact that he was who overheard the prophecy, etc. We also got the story of how Remus became a werewolf. And arguably, most importantly we filled in a lot of gaps in Voldemort/Tom Riddle’s story. I like that it was woven together, picking up little threads from previous books and building on them. I like the nature of the Wizarding half of his family. It provides us with a reasonable picture of how he became Lord Voldemort.
Dumbledore often speaks of Voldemort’s connection to Hogwarts, and that has in part driven his actions. In addition, I think learning about his parentage pushed him further down a path to eradicate those who were not of pureblood. It makes him part of a line of wizards that in his eyes should have been proud, wealthy, and powerful. Instead they were only proud. Their wealth and power had disappeared ages ago. So, in a certain sense, I think he feels as if he is restoring their rightful place. Before, he believed himself superior to the mudbloods and the muggle-born. It wasn’t unreasoning hatred as it now is. It was simple superiority in the Tom Riddle we saw in the Diary. He wants them out of his school. Now that he knows they have taken away what was his by birthright (in his own mind at least), he wants them all eradicated, every muggle, everyone of mixed blood, everyone sympathetic to their cause.
Concerning Canon Pairings
I could have lived without all of the emphasis on pairing people up. It often felt forced. I’m not thrilled with the Harry/Ginny love story. Even on the written page they don’t seem to have any real chemistry to me, and I’m still annoyed at her transformation (beginning in OotP) into Super-Ginny. It’s not just that my twisted little slasher’s heart would much rather see Harry with one of our less-than noble boys. I always expected Harry to get paired off, probably even to Ginny. I just hate the way Rowling did it.
For one thing, I don’t like this whole idea that Ginny only dated other boys so that Harry might notice her. It’s stupid and demeaning to girls. Secondly, the overwhelming jealousy just is beyond annoying. Harry's shown jealousy before, but never at this intensity, and never jealousy that could be viewed as purely about a girl. Harry had a million reasons to be jealous of Cedric, his relationship with Cho was just the tipping point. What possible reason does he have to be jealous of Dean.
I’m also starting to get the feeling that the only way Rowling knows to start a relationship is with jealous realization. It happened with Cho and now with Ginny for Harry. The relationship between Ron and Hermione (shipper or not) has always been about jealousy. Hermione was jealous of the way Ron made over Fleur and Ron was unreasonably jealous of Viktor. It’s as if her characters can’t see each other except through jealousy. It’s sad, and a fairly bitter commentary on love.
I actually enjoyed the Bill/Fleur relationship. I think it’s nice that in the end we get to see Fleur as someone with some backbone and a sense of loyalty. She’s one character that ceases to be a caricature for me. It’s also a nice glimpse into the ways living at war effects people. Bill and Fleur have known each other for less than two years at the opening of HBP and it’s clear that they’ve been engaged for some time already.
On the other hand, I was just annoyed by Tonks/Remus (more on this later). I’ve always just completely failed to read that subtext. I don’t get it. Worse, it’s all a little too melodramatic for me. We may not have seen a lot of Tonks, but she didn’t strike me as the type to let herself waste away. She’s a doer. She’s an auror, after all. She wouldn’t give up. She’d be working really hard to prove that a relationship is worth it for both of them. She wouldn’t be letting Remus give up on his own life either. And finally, Ron/Lavender was just nauseatingly appalling.
Concerning Horcruxes, Regulus Black, & Harry Potter
If I understood the concept correctly, there are six Horcruxes, six pieces of Voldemort’s soul. The journal was one. The ring was one. That leaves four and Dumbledore says that it would be the Slytherin locket that Voldemort took from the old lady (and which was conspiculously absent from the basin), Helga Hufflepuff’s chalice, a Ravenclaw or Gryffindor relic (which is problematic because the only known relic of Gryffindor is the sword which is hanging in Dumbledore’s office and nobody knows about a Ravenclaw relic), and Nagini. Not a clue on the Ravenclaw artifact or where to find it or the Hufflepuff chalice for that matter.
I believe the Slytherin locket was in the basin in the cave. I suspect that it is now at Grimmauld Place. Regulus Black is the only possibility I can come up with for RAB. Not so much now, but when the book first came out a lot of people were theorizing that he isn’t dead. I don’t buy it. Kreacher accepts Harry’s authority. I find it reasonable that Sirius’ wishes might override any claim of distant cousins, but if there were an actual Black heir, one in name, I don’t know that it would work. Besides, why should he have to be alive now to have written that note. We have no reason to believe that it hasn’t been there for a very long time. That being the case, this Horcrux could very well be at Grimmauld Place, perhaps in the pile of things that Kreacher has hidden away. It will probably be one of the last things he finds given Harry’s insistence that he never return to that place. I'm also wondering if Voldemort did not in fact carry out the killing of Regulus himself. Sirius doesn't find it likely, says that Regulus was never important enough. I'm not so sure.
It’s the Gryffindor relic that really bothers me. That Harry himself is the sixth Horcrux has been a popular theory, and in some ways it makes since. It’s a nicer explanation for why Harry has some of Voldemort’s abilities than that it was simply some kind of magical transferrence involved with how the spell was turned back on Voldemort. It might also explain why Voldemort was unable to kill Harry at that time. Maybe he has less than perfect control over the creation of the Horcruxes. Maybe he meant only to imbue the most direct descendant of Godric Gryffindor and did not know that this was Harry. It might mean that Voldemort is incapable of intentionally destroying a piece of his own soul or that it takes more special spellwork than he was aware of at that time. However, on second reading, it seems fairly unlikely to me. It seems that Voldemort clearly has to work some kind of spell to intentionally create a Horcrux and it very well may not have to happen at the precise moment of the murder. So it seems fairly unlikely that he could just do it by accident.
It seems to me that Voldemort was trying in earnest to kill Harry in the first book. In the second, I suppose it would have been before the creation of the Harry Horcrux and it is always possible that Tom Riddle would not recognize the other piece of his soul in Harry. It’s Peter Pettigrew who is the culprit in Book three. Book four could be problematic. Voldemort clearly seems to want Harry dead at this point. Perhaps he has discovered a way to release that part of soul back to himself. In Book five, Voldemort doesn’t actively try to kill Harry, but certainly doesn’t work to keep him safe. It just seems unreasonable that Voldemort would intentionally destroy his own Horcrux. Of course he is a delusional power-mad evil guy, so maybe he just doesn't care. He clearly didn't care that the diary would possibly, maybe even probably, eventually be destroyed. Still, he didn't actively set about destroying it himself either.
I do think that Harry would fulfill the idea of a relic of Gryffindor. I’ve suspected that Harry was, in fact, the heir of Gryffindor from the point in CoS where he pulls Gryffindor’s sword from the hat. It seems quite likely to me that he is the direct descendant of Gryffindor. It’s implied that James and Lily had a fortune of their own, and we have no other source of that fortune than James’ family which we know next to nothing about. What we do know is that the family cottage where they hid from Voldemort was in a place named Godric’s Hollow. That seems more than coincidence. There is also a certain nice amount of symmetry to having the heir of Slytherin and the heir of Gryffindor face off.
I'm really not at all thrilled about the idea of Nagini being a Horcrux. I can't say exactly why it feels off to me, but it does.
Concerning Severus Snape, Loyalty, & the HP/SS ship
So, Snape's loyalty is again in play. I think that it would be the height of bad storytelling for him to be evil at this point. Seriously, I've never questioned Snape's loyalty to Dumbledore. Let's look at a few of the reasons that people are so sure I'm wrong this time around.
First, the spells in the Potions book. These spells do not bother me at all. There are some fairly dark things, but we've always known that Snape has done some very dark things. It’s even highly implied that he did very dark things in school. Also, all of the reasons that Harry has for why a spell like the one which injures Draco might not be an indication that the author was evil are still just as relevant as they were before he knew it was Snape. That knowledge changes the way they view the spells and notes. It doesn’t have to change the way that we do. The very vivid picture we’ve been painted of Snape as a child shows us a kid who is sullen, unpopular, and certainly an angry teenager. It’s not unusual for kids that age to fantasize about the kind of retaliation they could have. It’s well within the realm of possibility that Snape wrote the spell without intending to use it. He might have done it when he was angry, working out the way to cause the damage might have taken the edge off of his anger without needing to actually use the spell. It might not be the healthiest outlet for anger, but it is certainly in line with the picture we have of an adolescent Snape. Most of the other spells are juvenile and fairly obnoxioux. If that meant someone was evil, there was little hope for James or Sirius.
Ultimately, everything else goes back to the death of Dumbledore, even the words he said at Spinner's End in the very beginning of the book. It's all about why he killed Dumbledore.
Lots of people (in the book and outside of it) talk about Dumbledore’s insistence on seeing the good in people. I’ve always thought that he was an excellent judge of character, and specifically that this book proved it. He immediately, within just a few moment of knowing Tom Riddle, judges that the boy is not to be trusted and must be watched. Yet we’re supposed to believe that Snape has been lying to him for nearly twenty years and he just never noticed. I simply don’t buy it.
We’re seeing a classic example of the unreliable narrator. We see so much of the world through Harry’s eyes and sometimes I think we forget that. Through Harry we see a look of hatred and loathing on Snape’s face. Through Harry we hear Dumbledore’s pleading cry.
I think that Dumbledore needs Snape to kill him. Dumbledore calls out to Snape not so that his life might be spared but so that Snape will fulfill this duty. Dumbledore would never plead for his life. Death is not the end nor is it the worst thing that can happen to a wizard. Those are Dumbledore’s words and I don’t believe that he would back away from them now.
As for the look of hatred, maybe Snape does hate Dumbledore in that instant. He must hate the choice he is being forced to make and Dumbledore for complicating the issue. This is, after all, an action that he can most likely see no way back from. Nobody in the Order will trust him again, and it thrusts him back into a world which he has come to loathe. Worse, it is unlikely that he will continue to work for Voldemort without dirtying his hands with further killing.
Snape is a survivor, but I think that he has learned Dumbledore’s lessons well. It is a seriously difficult decision for him, even when the choice is his own death or Dumbledore’s. It is only Dumbledore’s insistence that allows him to make it. He doesn’t want this responsibility. He hesitated over making the vow, and he falters here at the end. Dumbledore can’t allow Snape the luxury of death. There is still something that he must do (I sincerely hope we discover it in the final book). It’s also the only way to keep Draco alive, something which seems important to Dumbledore. It does nobody any good for Draco and Snape to both die. It would also likely still mean the death of Dumbledore. Dumbledore is firm in his belief that Snape is the only one who can help him.
This view is further upheld to me by their "fight" on the grounds midway through the book. Harry of course is certain that Snape is having some kind of whining fit about not wanting to be a spy anymore. That's just silly. If Snape wanted to betray Dumbledore, he'd simply stop being an effective spy. He'd turn over the vital information that he has about the order (that is not protected by a secret keeper) to Voldemort and be done with it. He wouldn't whine and carry on to the very person he was about to betray. It certainly wouldn't be very Slytherin to do so. That means that Dumbledore must be asking something of him that he doesn't want to do and he thinks there is some reasonable chance of Dumbledore relenting. It must be something that will not destroy all the work he has done. I think it was fulfilling the unbreakable vow he made to Narcissa. Which, if I'm right, means he promptly told Dumbledore about that conversation. And speaking of that conversation. We have to assume that Snape would have told Voldemort substantially the same story whether he was truly loyal to Voldemort or to Dumbledore. Either way, the goal is to get back into the good graces of Voldemort. He'd be pretty useless as a spy if he made up crappy explanations for all the things that are bothering Bellatrix. If anything, his answers need to be even tighter and stronger as a spy, because they must remove him from suspicion to the point that even later acts which might be construed as suspicious can be easily brushed away.
The next damning piece of evidence that Harry offers up is the idea that Snape came to Dumbledore out of remorse for his part in the death of James and Lily. He clearly doesn’t believe it. After all, Snape hated James and there’s no evidence that he thought more of James’ mudblood wife. I find a couple of faults here. First, he says that Dumbledore says this is the reason that he trusts Snape. Dumbledore never said that. He said that he trusted Snape and he wants to hear no more about it. He also mentions that Snape felt a great deal of remorse over James and Lily’s deaths. He doesn’t link them in any way. Even if had, it’s not unreasonable to assume that Snape’s part in their death was a huge cause for remorse in Snape.
We learned in PoA that life debts are powerful things in the Wizarding world. Dumbledore tells Harry that Pettigrew cannot be absolved of the debt. Snape owes a similar debt to James. He didn’t like him. He might rather have died than to owe such a debt, but he does owe it. Even if we assume that the debt has now been fulfilled (not a safe assumption by a long shot, but more on that later), the realization that he had an active part in the death of a man whom he owed a life debt was surely more than a little disturbing to him.
As for the debt, I don’t think it is fulfilled, and I doubt that Snape does either. The debt does not simply remain unfulfilled. If Snape had no part in James’ death that would be the case, but as it is, it was actively destroyed. Surely that increases the burden of the debt. Beyond that, the debt was owed to James, not Harry. If James were alive, not only would Harry likely be in significantly less danger, but his father would be there to protect him. In the absence of that protection, Snape is obligated to do the job that James would have done. Saving Harry’s life once, twice, even a dozen times does not erase the debt.
Another bit of evidence against Snape is Dumbledore’s supposed reasons for not giving Snape the DADA position. We’ll never know why he didn’t do it. Harry and the others assume it was to keep Snape as far away from the Dark Arts as possible. I doubt that. I suspect that Dumbledore simply didn’t think it was a good place for him. Potions seems to be something that those with a gift for them would, if not appreciate, at least work reasonably well within Snape’s rigid structure. DADA requires a more flexible personality and it is something that Dumbledore has reason to believe that all of his students will need in the near future. He isn’t blind to Snape’s faults, one of which is being a truly horrendous teacher. Beyond that, whether the position of DADA professor is cursed or not, Dumbledore certainly seems to believe it is. No professor has held the position for longer than a single term since he refused to give it to Voldemort. He wants to keep Snape close. It not only makes it easier to use him as a spy without arousing undue suspicion from Voldemort, but it offers Snape a measure of protection. So he certainly won't be given a position that will only last a year. I think if Dumbledore could have found a way around it, he wouldn't have given that job to Snape in HBP.
I think that we are given other evidence in Snape’s actions that night that point to his remaining loyal. It seems entirely likely to me that Snape knew or at least could guess that Harry was on that tower. He's smart. He takes things in quickly. We have every reason to believe that he knew Harry was with Dumbledore, but even if he didn’t, he would have seen the two brooms and he knows about Harry’s invisibility cloak.
He had every opportunity to kill Ron and Hermione earlier. If he was going to blow his cover that night anyway, why not do it in a big way. Voldemort certainly wouldn’t have been upset that he killed the mudblood and the blood traitor. Instead he leaves them very much alive and as safe as he can make them, out of harm's way even. Later, he could have at least disarmed Harry. He reminds the other DEs that Voldemort says Harry is his, but that certainly shouldn’t stop him from disarming Harry. Instead, he takes particular care to leave Harry with his wand and to prevent him from using the unforgivable curses. Maybe he really is just trying to spare himself the pain, but it seems to me that it would be much easier to disarm Harry than to prevent him from speaking.
We are left with every reason to believe that the only person Snape kills this night is Dumbledore. He would have been in the perfect position to have wiped out an enormous part of the order. They trust him. He could have decimated the competition, instead he only kills one man, and that after a seeming fight with his own conscience.
Certainly he flies into a rage when Harry attempts to use his own spells against him. That's entirely in character. He has a shorter temper, and it's shorter where Harry Potter is concerned. He looks at Harry and sees a living reminder of another young man who used his own spells against him. A man who taunted and teased and was just downright cruel to him in school. Worse, a man who he owes his life to. But even in that moment of anger, he controls himself. He stops Harry from harming him and he walks away.
As for the ship, I’m not so hopeful. I might be able to find a way to work around it in a fic, and I’m already tired of reading how the ship is dead. That alone might be enough to make me prove it can be done without going wildly AU. That said, I don’t find it particularly realistic. At best, they’ll have a dark, dysfunctional, thoroughly unhappy relationship. In truth, I think Snape will die in book seven. I think that his death will be heroic and that afterwards, Harry might see that he was never disloyal. If he lives, even if Snape could prove he was loyal to Dumbledore, I’m not sure that Harry is capable of forgiving him for Dumbledore’s death, no matter how necessary it was. That said, I’m not abandoning the ship or my WIPs.
Concerning Draco, Redemption, and the HP/DM ship
Draco was at his most human in this book. The nice thing for me is, that in many ways we see him as I have always envisioned him. He believes what he has been told by his parents. He’s arrogant, and can be obnoxious, but deep down, he simply doesn’t possess the same ability to be coldly cruel that his father does. Calculating cruelty is simply not in his makeup. That said, he’s far from perfect. He is often casually cruel, not just to his enemies but to his supposed friends as well. I’m not sure which is worse. Voldemort/Tom Riddle has exhibited both types of cruelty, but I would tend to think that he leans toward the calculating. I wonder if perhaps his cruelty isn’t a function of his arrogance. If he is stripped of some of that, what will it do to the rest of his personality. I think he might be kinder. He’d still be sarcastic and there would be a bitterness which can carry it’s own cruel edge, but he’d definitely be different.
He is in increasingly poor health throughout the book and the presumption is that stress from not completing his mission causes this. That’s probably true. He does know the consequence of failure. Yet, even knowing the consequences, he can’t bring himself to kill Dumbledore in the end. JKR has said that there will be no redemption for Draco. I’ve said that he doesn’t need redemption nearly so much as he needs saving. Either way, what happened here looks an awful lot like one or the other.
On top of that we have the conversations with Moaning Myrtle. Those happened at least twice. It seems unlikely that he is just whining about his lack of success. The tone of the little we hear seems like more of a struggle with whether to go through with it. He doesn’t want to do this, but he feels like he has to. He feels like there are no options; nobody can help him. He is lost. The fact that he can recognize this about himself is a pretty sure sign that he is not beyond saving.
Here’s the question. With the only Wizard that Voldemort was ever afraid of gone, how will Draco ever be able to turn his back on the protection that being Voldemort’s servant provides for him? I think it’s imminently possible that he will also die in the seventh book, unsaved in the end.
Unlike HP/SS, I think the future is bright for HP/DM. For the first time, Harry sees Draco as something more than a spoiled little brat. For the first time, he sees Draco as human, as a living breathing person with hopes, fears, and a whole host of other feelings. I greatly looked forward to some post HBP fic for this ship. Sadly it never really materialized as I'd envisioned it. I guess that means that I'll have to write it myself, but maybe I should finish any one of the half-dozen half-written stories I've got on the hard drive first.
Concerning Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, and Love
A lot of people are very upset with the RL/Tonks relationship, because they see it as hurting RL/SB. I just don’t see how. We may not like it, but Sirius is gone. In a safe and comfortable world, I might think that Remus hasn’t had nearly enough time to complete the grieving process. In HBP we have a world at war, emotions are accelerated. It is not at all unusual for someone to quickly find love even after the death of a loved one, in this kind of environment.
I've always shipped Sirius and Remus. I think the relationship falls just short of being outright textual rather than subtextual. I've not quite reconciled in my mind whether I think they were together pre-war, but I certainly think they were no later than Christmas OotP giving them at least a few good months before Sirius' death.
In the end, if it had been written differently, I might have even gotten behind a Tonks/Remus relationship. I just don’t understand how it in any way diminishes what Remus and Sirius might have had.
Concerning Dumbledore
I love Dumbledore. I utterly and completely adore the character. That said, he’s a manipulative, secretive old man who never lets anyone see the whole picture. I think that’s at the heart of this particular book. I think it’s part of the answer to several things we have yet to puzzle out. I hope that in the end, even in his death, we’ll be able to see Dumbledore’s grand plan.
I think he knew that he was going to die. He might not have known the precise circumstances, but he knew he would die this school year. It’s in the breadth and range of answers that he gave to Harry, the responsibilities that he laid on him, and the knowledge he passed on. I still don’t think that Harry has the full picture, but from early in the book Dumbledore was rapidly preparing him, no more of this slow trickle of information that had happened for the five previous years.
On the tower when he talks to Draco, he says that he never confronted him earlier because he knew what would happen to Draco. He also tells Draco that he doesn’t believe he will kill him now. What’s the point in saving Draco for all of those months only to let him fail tonight. Dumbledore has to know at this point that he’s going to die, must know it even as he is protecting Draco earlier in the book.
I’ve said that I believe in Snape’s loyalty, and I do, without reservation. So why wouldn’t Dumbledore explain Snape’s role in this to someone, anyone? I think he’s protecting Snape. Dumbledore is an excellent judge of character. here are few people that he could trust with this information, and most, if not all, of them are utterly transparent. The one exception may have been Remus, but I don’t know that Remus could have stood by and allowed Snape to kill Dumbledore, even if he knew it had to be. But the others, and most especially Harry himself, would never be able to lie convincingly enough that they could trust Snape without allowing it to show. Harry can keep a secret, he can refuse to talk about something that has happened. What he can’t do is hide his feelings. It’s been fairly clear for some time now that Harry, despite his intense dislike, basically trusts Snape. He clearly does. If he didn’t he wouldn’t get so angry whenever he found some new evidence that Snape might not be someone he should trust. He doesn’t want to trust Snape, but he does. That was fine to this point. For Voldemort, it meant that Snape was doing his job successfully. It was more than explainable, it was desirable when Snape was playing double-agent. Now that his cover is entirely blown with the order, it would be disastrous for any of them to seem to trust him. Such trust would be proof of Snape’s loyalty to Dumbledore. Voldemort is paranoid, he couldn’t possibly fail to see this, leaving him to wonder A) What is so important about Draco that Dumbledore would die to save him and B) Is Dumbledore really dead? Not to mention questioning how Snape might be acting against him right now. If Snape is truly loyal to Dumbledore, it is imperative, right now, for everyone to believe that he is not.
Last note. There’s a persistent theory that Dumbledore is in fact, not dead. I don’t believe it. More than anything else, Fawkes’ mournful song clinches it for me. Dumbledore is dead. Let’s hope he knew what he was doing.
And One Last Wild Theory Concerning McGonagall
This has been added entirely after my second recent reading of the book. It seems that there's a very vocal fandom contingent right now who believe that McGonagall is really the traitor. It was after reading so many iterations of this theory that I decided I really needed to go back and read books 1 & 2, because I certainly couldn't find anything to support the idea in books 3-6.
I still haven't. The theory goes something like this. Somebody must be a traitor. It's not Snape for some variation or combination of the theories outlined above and a few others that I didn't use. It's somebody that everybody trusts without hesitation. Everyone trusts McGonagall. McGonagall isn't a warm motherly figure with Harry. McGonagall must be evil.
They'll then pick apart a few of the scenes where they believed that she was being unusually harsh on Harry, and harp on and on about her lack of maternal care for him. I'll say this, those instances are certainly there. She can be very hard on Harry. She expects a great deal from him, and that sometimes means she has to be harder than you might expect on him. She's also not at all the maternal type. She isn't that way with anyone. Besides which it would be redundant. Rowling already gave Harry a substitute mother in Molly Weasley. He doesn't need another. He does need a disciplinarian who isn't Snape. She is that person. She's not cold, or at least not any colder to Harry than she is to anyone else. I just see no evidence that she's anything other than a slightly severe older woman. Also, I don't really think people are invested enough in the character for it to be a huge deal if she ends up evil. It might come out of left field, but nobody will really feel terribly betrayed or hurt that this beloved character was a bad guy. If someone unexpected ends up being a traitor it has to be someone that the average fan has a real emotional investment in. I just don't think McGonagall is that person. If anyone sees it and thinks they can explain to me where this evidence is, I'd love to hear it.
Some things have been added and some removed with my re-read. For one thing, I can now say that I've read all of the first six books. I only read Sorcerer's Stone and Chamber of Secrets just last month. Can't say I'm sorry I waited that long. For another, things that really really annoyed me on first read-through didn't annoy me nearly as much on the second go-round. Other things, which my brain had happily skipped right over the first time, just hit me wrong this time. And, after reading more message boards and LJ posts than I usually bother to pay any attention to with theories galore for the last book, I simply have to offer up my responses to some of the craziness. Because this is extraordinarily long, it's behind a series of cuts.
General Reaction
I thought this was a competent if not altogether inspired book. The quality of the writing itself was actually better than I’ve come to expect from Rowling. It was the story that often failed to click for me. Typically, I've had the opposite issue with her books. The stories were engaging, and the characters compelling enough that I overlooked the mediocre writing. In fact, it was what I felt was poor writing that kept me from reading the first two books for such a long time.
I'd picked up Sorcerer's Stone after the movie came out and really tried to read it. I never made it more than ten or fifteen pages in. This year, I forced myself through it, but I still didn't enjoy it or Chamber of Secrets nearly as much as I have the other four books.
Overall, HBP felt unfinished. I didn’t expect it to wrap all the conclusions up with a nice neat little ribbon, but there was an unusual amount of unfinished business. I never felt closure. Dumbledore’s funeral, I think, was supposed to provide that, but it failed spectacularly in my mind.
There were good points to the book. It had a compelling mystery. There was the question of what Draco was up to. Snape’s loyalty was, as always, in play. I had the former figured out for certain after Ron’s poisoning (though that was probably at least partly due to the influence of morons who posted spoilers in subject lines in the first couple days after the book was released), and I have never seriously doubted the latter. Still, they were genuine mysteries for some. And there were other smaller mysteries that I found even more compelling. What was the mysterious item in Borgin and Burkes and of course who was the Half-blood Prince. I might have had that one figured out a little early, but not right away, not for sure.
I enjoyed the amount of background information in the book. I’m a complete backstory whore, so it was a great thing for me. The background on Snape was excellent. His half-blood heritage, the fact that he was who overheard the prophecy, etc. We also got the story of how Remus became a werewolf. And arguably, most importantly we filled in a lot of gaps in Voldemort/Tom Riddle’s story. I like that it was woven together, picking up little threads from previous books and building on them. I like the nature of the Wizarding half of his family. It provides us with a reasonable picture of how he became Lord Voldemort.
Dumbledore often speaks of Voldemort’s connection to Hogwarts, and that has in part driven his actions. In addition, I think learning about his parentage pushed him further down a path to eradicate those who were not of pureblood. It makes him part of a line of wizards that in his eyes should have been proud, wealthy, and powerful. Instead they were only proud. Their wealth and power had disappeared ages ago. So, in a certain sense, I think he feels as if he is restoring their rightful place. Before, he believed himself superior to the mudbloods and the muggle-born. It wasn’t unreasoning hatred as it now is. It was simple superiority in the Tom Riddle we saw in the Diary. He wants them out of his school. Now that he knows they have taken away what was his by birthright (in his own mind at least), he wants them all eradicated, every muggle, everyone of mixed blood, everyone sympathetic to their cause.
Concerning Canon Pairings
I could have lived without all of the emphasis on pairing people up. It often felt forced. I’m not thrilled with the Harry/Ginny love story. Even on the written page they don’t seem to have any real chemistry to me, and I’m still annoyed at her transformation (beginning in OotP) into Super-Ginny. It’s not just that my twisted little slasher’s heart would much rather see Harry with one of our less-than noble boys. I always expected Harry to get paired off, probably even to Ginny. I just hate the way Rowling did it.
For one thing, I don’t like this whole idea that Ginny only dated other boys so that Harry might notice her. It’s stupid and demeaning to girls. Secondly, the overwhelming jealousy just is beyond annoying. Harry's shown jealousy before, but never at this intensity, and never jealousy that could be viewed as purely about a girl. Harry had a million reasons to be jealous of Cedric, his relationship with Cho was just the tipping point. What possible reason does he have to be jealous of Dean.
I’m also starting to get the feeling that the only way Rowling knows to start a relationship is with jealous realization. It happened with Cho and now with Ginny for Harry. The relationship between Ron and Hermione (shipper or not) has always been about jealousy. Hermione was jealous of the way Ron made over Fleur and Ron was unreasonably jealous of Viktor. It’s as if her characters can’t see each other except through jealousy. It’s sad, and a fairly bitter commentary on love.
I actually enjoyed the Bill/Fleur relationship. I think it’s nice that in the end we get to see Fleur as someone with some backbone and a sense of loyalty. She’s one character that ceases to be a caricature for me. It’s also a nice glimpse into the ways living at war effects people. Bill and Fleur have known each other for less than two years at the opening of HBP and it’s clear that they’ve been engaged for some time already.
On the other hand, I was just annoyed by Tonks/Remus (more on this later). I’ve always just completely failed to read that subtext. I don’t get it. Worse, it’s all a little too melodramatic for me. We may not have seen a lot of Tonks, but she didn’t strike me as the type to let herself waste away. She’s a doer. She’s an auror, after all. She wouldn’t give up. She’d be working really hard to prove that a relationship is worth it for both of them. She wouldn’t be letting Remus give up on his own life either. And finally, Ron/Lavender was just nauseatingly appalling.
Concerning Horcruxes, Regulus Black, & Harry Potter
If I understood the concept correctly, there are six Horcruxes, six pieces of Voldemort’s soul. The journal was one. The ring was one. That leaves four and Dumbledore says that it would be the Slytherin locket that Voldemort took from the old lady (and which was conspiculously absent from the basin), Helga Hufflepuff’s chalice, a Ravenclaw or Gryffindor relic (which is problematic because the only known relic of Gryffindor is the sword which is hanging in Dumbledore’s office and nobody knows about a Ravenclaw relic), and Nagini. Not a clue on the Ravenclaw artifact or where to find it or the Hufflepuff chalice for that matter.
I believe the Slytherin locket was in the basin in the cave. I suspect that it is now at Grimmauld Place. Regulus Black is the only possibility I can come up with for RAB. Not so much now, but when the book first came out a lot of people were theorizing that he isn’t dead. I don’t buy it. Kreacher accepts Harry’s authority. I find it reasonable that Sirius’ wishes might override any claim of distant cousins, but if there were an actual Black heir, one in name, I don’t know that it would work. Besides, why should he have to be alive now to have written that note. We have no reason to believe that it hasn’t been there for a very long time. That being the case, this Horcrux could very well be at Grimmauld Place, perhaps in the pile of things that Kreacher has hidden away. It will probably be one of the last things he finds given Harry’s insistence that he never return to that place. I'm also wondering if Voldemort did not in fact carry out the killing of Regulus himself. Sirius doesn't find it likely, says that Regulus was never important enough. I'm not so sure.
It’s the Gryffindor relic that really bothers me. That Harry himself is the sixth Horcrux has been a popular theory, and in some ways it makes since. It’s a nicer explanation for why Harry has some of Voldemort’s abilities than that it was simply some kind of magical transferrence involved with how the spell was turned back on Voldemort. It might also explain why Voldemort was unable to kill Harry at that time. Maybe he has less than perfect control over the creation of the Horcruxes. Maybe he meant only to imbue the most direct descendant of Godric Gryffindor and did not know that this was Harry. It might mean that Voldemort is incapable of intentionally destroying a piece of his own soul or that it takes more special spellwork than he was aware of at that time. However, on second reading, it seems fairly unlikely to me. It seems that Voldemort clearly has to work some kind of spell to intentionally create a Horcrux and it very well may not have to happen at the precise moment of the murder. So it seems fairly unlikely that he could just do it by accident.
It seems to me that Voldemort was trying in earnest to kill Harry in the first book. In the second, I suppose it would have been before the creation of the Harry Horcrux and it is always possible that Tom Riddle would not recognize the other piece of his soul in Harry. It’s Peter Pettigrew who is the culprit in Book three. Book four could be problematic. Voldemort clearly seems to want Harry dead at this point. Perhaps he has discovered a way to release that part of soul back to himself. In Book five, Voldemort doesn’t actively try to kill Harry, but certainly doesn’t work to keep him safe. It just seems unreasonable that Voldemort would intentionally destroy his own Horcrux. Of course he is a delusional power-mad evil guy, so maybe he just doesn't care. He clearly didn't care that the diary would possibly, maybe even probably, eventually be destroyed. Still, he didn't actively set about destroying it himself either.
I do think that Harry would fulfill the idea of a relic of Gryffindor. I’ve suspected that Harry was, in fact, the heir of Gryffindor from the point in CoS where he pulls Gryffindor’s sword from the hat. It seems quite likely to me that he is the direct descendant of Gryffindor. It’s implied that James and Lily had a fortune of their own, and we have no other source of that fortune than James’ family which we know next to nothing about. What we do know is that the family cottage where they hid from Voldemort was in a place named Godric’s Hollow. That seems more than coincidence. There is also a certain nice amount of symmetry to having the heir of Slytherin and the heir of Gryffindor face off.
I'm really not at all thrilled about the idea of Nagini being a Horcrux. I can't say exactly why it feels off to me, but it does.
Concerning Severus Snape, Loyalty, & the HP/SS ship
So, Snape's loyalty is again in play. I think that it would be the height of bad storytelling for him to be evil at this point. Seriously, I've never questioned Snape's loyalty to Dumbledore. Let's look at a few of the reasons that people are so sure I'm wrong this time around.
First, the spells in the Potions book. These spells do not bother me at all. There are some fairly dark things, but we've always known that Snape has done some very dark things. It’s even highly implied that he did very dark things in school. Also, all of the reasons that Harry has for why a spell like the one which injures Draco might not be an indication that the author was evil are still just as relevant as they were before he knew it was Snape. That knowledge changes the way they view the spells and notes. It doesn’t have to change the way that we do. The very vivid picture we’ve been painted of Snape as a child shows us a kid who is sullen, unpopular, and certainly an angry teenager. It’s not unusual for kids that age to fantasize about the kind of retaliation they could have. It’s well within the realm of possibility that Snape wrote the spell without intending to use it. He might have done it when he was angry, working out the way to cause the damage might have taken the edge off of his anger without needing to actually use the spell. It might not be the healthiest outlet for anger, but it is certainly in line with the picture we have of an adolescent Snape. Most of the other spells are juvenile and fairly obnoxioux. If that meant someone was evil, there was little hope for James or Sirius.
Ultimately, everything else goes back to the death of Dumbledore, even the words he said at Spinner's End in the very beginning of the book. It's all about why he killed Dumbledore.
Lots of people (in the book and outside of it) talk about Dumbledore’s insistence on seeing the good in people. I’ve always thought that he was an excellent judge of character, and specifically that this book proved it. He immediately, within just a few moment of knowing Tom Riddle, judges that the boy is not to be trusted and must be watched. Yet we’re supposed to believe that Snape has been lying to him for nearly twenty years and he just never noticed. I simply don’t buy it.
We’re seeing a classic example of the unreliable narrator. We see so much of the world through Harry’s eyes and sometimes I think we forget that. Through Harry we see a look of hatred and loathing on Snape’s face. Through Harry we hear Dumbledore’s pleading cry.
I think that Dumbledore needs Snape to kill him. Dumbledore calls out to Snape not so that his life might be spared but so that Snape will fulfill this duty. Dumbledore would never plead for his life. Death is not the end nor is it the worst thing that can happen to a wizard. Those are Dumbledore’s words and I don’t believe that he would back away from them now.
As for the look of hatred, maybe Snape does hate Dumbledore in that instant. He must hate the choice he is being forced to make and Dumbledore for complicating the issue. This is, after all, an action that he can most likely see no way back from. Nobody in the Order will trust him again, and it thrusts him back into a world which he has come to loathe. Worse, it is unlikely that he will continue to work for Voldemort without dirtying his hands with further killing.
Snape is a survivor, but I think that he has learned Dumbledore’s lessons well. It is a seriously difficult decision for him, even when the choice is his own death or Dumbledore’s. It is only Dumbledore’s insistence that allows him to make it. He doesn’t want this responsibility. He hesitated over making the vow, and he falters here at the end. Dumbledore can’t allow Snape the luxury of death. There is still something that he must do (I sincerely hope we discover it in the final book). It’s also the only way to keep Draco alive, something which seems important to Dumbledore. It does nobody any good for Draco and Snape to both die. It would also likely still mean the death of Dumbledore. Dumbledore is firm in his belief that Snape is the only one who can help him.
This view is further upheld to me by their "fight" on the grounds midway through the book. Harry of course is certain that Snape is having some kind of whining fit about not wanting to be a spy anymore. That's just silly. If Snape wanted to betray Dumbledore, he'd simply stop being an effective spy. He'd turn over the vital information that he has about the order (that is not protected by a secret keeper) to Voldemort and be done with it. He wouldn't whine and carry on to the very person he was about to betray. It certainly wouldn't be very Slytherin to do so. That means that Dumbledore must be asking something of him that he doesn't want to do and he thinks there is some reasonable chance of Dumbledore relenting. It must be something that will not destroy all the work he has done. I think it was fulfilling the unbreakable vow he made to Narcissa. Which, if I'm right, means he promptly told Dumbledore about that conversation. And speaking of that conversation. We have to assume that Snape would have told Voldemort substantially the same story whether he was truly loyal to Voldemort or to Dumbledore. Either way, the goal is to get back into the good graces of Voldemort. He'd be pretty useless as a spy if he made up crappy explanations for all the things that are bothering Bellatrix. If anything, his answers need to be even tighter and stronger as a spy, because they must remove him from suspicion to the point that even later acts which might be construed as suspicious can be easily brushed away.
The next damning piece of evidence that Harry offers up is the idea that Snape came to Dumbledore out of remorse for his part in the death of James and Lily. He clearly doesn’t believe it. After all, Snape hated James and there’s no evidence that he thought more of James’ mudblood wife. I find a couple of faults here. First, he says that Dumbledore says this is the reason that he trusts Snape. Dumbledore never said that. He said that he trusted Snape and he wants to hear no more about it. He also mentions that Snape felt a great deal of remorse over James and Lily’s deaths. He doesn’t link them in any way. Even if had, it’s not unreasonable to assume that Snape’s part in their death was a huge cause for remorse in Snape.
We learned in PoA that life debts are powerful things in the Wizarding world. Dumbledore tells Harry that Pettigrew cannot be absolved of the debt. Snape owes a similar debt to James. He didn’t like him. He might rather have died than to owe such a debt, but he does owe it. Even if we assume that the debt has now been fulfilled (not a safe assumption by a long shot, but more on that later), the realization that he had an active part in the death of a man whom he owed a life debt was surely more than a little disturbing to him.
As for the debt, I don’t think it is fulfilled, and I doubt that Snape does either. The debt does not simply remain unfulfilled. If Snape had no part in James’ death that would be the case, but as it is, it was actively destroyed. Surely that increases the burden of the debt. Beyond that, the debt was owed to James, not Harry. If James were alive, not only would Harry likely be in significantly less danger, but his father would be there to protect him. In the absence of that protection, Snape is obligated to do the job that James would have done. Saving Harry’s life once, twice, even a dozen times does not erase the debt.
Another bit of evidence against Snape is Dumbledore’s supposed reasons for not giving Snape the DADA position. We’ll never know why he didn’t do it. Harry and the others assume it was to keep Snape as far away from the Dark Arts as possible. I doubt that. I suspect that Dumbledore simply didn’t think it was a good place for him. Potions seems to be something that those with a gift for them would, if not appreciate, at least work reasonably well within Snape’s rigid structure. DADA requires a more flexible personality and it is something that Dumbledore has reason to believe that all of his students will need in the near future. He isn’t blind to Snape’s faults, one of which is being a truly horrendous teacher. Beyond that, whether the position of DADA professor is cursed or not, Dumbledore certainly seems to believe it is. No professor has held the position for longer than a single term since he refused to give it to Voldemort. He wants to keep Snape close. It not only makes it easier to use him as a spy without arousing undue suspicion from Voldemort, but it offers Snape a measure of protection. So he certainly won't be given a position that will only last a year. I think if Dumbledore could have found a way around it, he wouldn't have given that job to Snape in HBP.
I think that we are given other evidence in Snape’s actions that night that point to his remaining loyal. It seems entirely likely to me that Snape knew or at least could guess that Harry was on that tower. He's smart. He takes things in quickly. We have every reason to believe that he knew Harry was with Dumbledore, but even if he didn’t, he would have seen the two brooms and he knows about Harry’s invisibility cloak.
He had every opportunity to kill Ron and Hermione earlier. If he was going to blow his cover that night anyway, why not do it in a big way. Voldemort certainly wouldn’t have been upset that he killed the mudblood and the blood traitor. Instead he leaves them very much alive and as safe as he can make them, out of harm's way even. Later, he could have at least disarmed Harry. He reminds the other DEs that Voldemort says Harry is his, but that certainly shouldn’t stop him from disarming Harry. Instead, he takes particular care to leave Harry with his wand and to prevent him from using the unforgivable curses. Maybe he really is just trying to spare himself the pain, but it seems to me that it would be much easier to disarm Harry than to prevent him from speaking.
We are left with every reason to believe that the only person Snape kills this night is Dumbledore. He would have been in the perfect position to have wiped out an enormous part of the order. They trust him. He could have decimated the competition, instead he only kills one man, and that after a seeming fight with his own conscience.
Certainly he flies into a rage when Harry attempts to use his own spells against him. That's entirely in character. He has a shorter temper, and it's shorter where Harry Potter is concerned. He looks at Harry and sees a living reminder of another young man who used his own spells against him. A man who taunted and teased and was just downright cruel to him in school. Worse, a man who he owes his life to. But even in that moment of anger, he controls himself. He stops Harry from harming him and he walks away.
As for the ship, I’m not so hopeful. I might be able to find a way to work around it in a fic, and I’m already tired of reading how the ship is dead. That alone might be enough to make me prove it can be done without going wildly AU. That said, I don’t find it particularly realistic. At best, they’ll have a dark, dysfunctional, thoroughly unhappy relationship. In truth, I think Snape will die in book seven. I think that his death will be heroic and that afterwards, Harry might see that he was never disloyal. If he lives, even if Snape could prove he was loyal to Dumbledore, I’m not sure that Harry is capable of forgiving him for Dumbledore’s death, no matter how necessary it was. That said, I’m not abandoning the ship or my WIPs.
Concerning Draco, Redemption, and the HP/DM ship
Draco was at his most human in this book. The nice thing for me is, that in many ways we see him as I have always envisioned him. He believes what he has been told by his parents. He’s arrogant, and can be obnoxious, but deep down, he simply doesn’t possess the same ability to be coldly cruel that his father does. Calculating cruelty is simply not in his makeup. That said, he’s far from perfect. He is often casually cruel, not just to his enemies but to his supposed friends as well. I’m not sure which is worse. Voldemort/Tom Riddle has exhibited both types of cruelty, but I would tend to think that he leans toward the calculating. I wonder if perhaps his cruelty isn’t a function of his arrogance. If he is stripped of some of that, what will it do to the rest of his personality. I think he might be kinder. He’d still be sarcastic and there would be a bitterness which can carry it’s own cruel edge, but he’d definitely be different.
He is in increasingly poor health throughout the book and the presumption is that stress from not completing his mission causes this. That’s probably true. He does know the consequence of failure. Yet, even knowing the consequences, he can’t bring himself to kill Dumbledore in the end. JKR has said that there will be no redemption for Draco. I’ve said that he doesn’t need redemption nearly so much as he needs saving. Either way, what happened here looks an awful lot like one or the other.
On top of that we have the conversations with Moaning Myrtle. Those happened at least twice. It seems unlikely that he is just whining about his lack of success. The tone of the little we hear seems like more of a struggle with whether to go through with it. He doesn’t want to do this, but he feels like he has to. He feels like there are no options; nobody can help him. He is lost. The fact that he can recognize this about himself is a pretty sure sign that he is not beyond saving.
Here’s the question. With the only Wizard that Voldemort was ever afraid of gone, how will Draco ever be able to turn his back on the protection that being Voldemort’s servant provides for him? I think it’s imminently possible that he will also die in the seventh book, unsaved in the end.
Unlike HP/SS, I think the future is bright for HP/DM. For the first time, Harry sees Draco as something more than a spoiled little brat. For the first time, he sees Draco as human, as a living breathing person with hopes, fears, and a whole host of other feelings. I greatly looked forward to some post HBP fic for this ship. Sadly it never really materialized as I'd envisioned it. I guess that means that I'll have to write it myself, but maybe I should finish any one of the half-dozen half-written stories I've got on the hard drive first.
Concerning Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, and Love
A lot of people are very upset with the RL/Tonks relationship, because they see it as hurting RL/SB. I just don’t see how. We may not like it, but Sirius is gone. In a safe and comfortable world, I might think that Remus hasn’t had nearly enough time to complete the grieving process. In HBP we have a world at war, emotions are accelerated. It is not at all unusual for someone to quickly find love even after the death of a loved one, in this kind of environment.
I've always shipped Sirius and Remus. I think the relationship falls just short of being outright textual rather than subtextual. I've not quite reconciled in my mind whether I think they were together pre-war, but I certainly think they were no later than Christmas OotP giving them at least a few good months before Sirius' death.
In the end, if it had been written differently, I might have even gotten behind a Tonks/Remus relationship. I just don’t understand how it in any way diminishes what Remus and Sirius might have had.
Concerning Dumbledore
I love Dumbledore. I utterly and completely adore the character. That said, he’s a manipulative, secretive old man who never lets anyone see the whole picture. I think that’s at the heart of this particular book. I think it’s part of the answer to several things we have yet to puzzle out. I hope that in the end, even in his death, we’ll be able to see Dumbledore’s grand plan.
I think he knew that he was going to die. He might not have known the precise circumstances, but he knew he would die this school year. It’s in the breadth and range of answers that he gave to Harry, the responsibilities that he laid on him, and the knowledge he passed on. I still don’t think that Harry has the full picture, but from early in the book Dumbledore was rapidly preparing him, no more of this slow trickle of information that had happened for the five previous years.
On the tower when he talks to Draco, he says that he never confronted him earlier because he knew what would happen to Draco. He also tells Draco that he doesn’t believe he will kill him now. What’s the point in saving Draco for all of those months only to let him fail tonight. Dumbledore has to know at this point that he’s going to die, must know it even as he is protecting Draco earlier in the book.
I’ve said that I believe in Snape’s loyalty, and I do, without reservation. So why wouldn’t Dumbledore explain Snape’s role in this to someone, anyone? I think he’s protecting Snape. Dumbledore is an excellent judge of character. here are few people that he could trust with this information, and most, if not all, of them are utterly transparent. The one exception may have been Remus, but I don’t know that Remus could have stood by and allowed Snape to kill Dumbledore, even if he knew it had to be. But the others, and most especially Harry himself, would never be able to lie convincingly enough that they could trust Snape without allowing it to show. Harry can keep a secret, he can refuse to talk about something that has happened. What he can’t do is hide his feelings. It’s been fairly clear for some time now that Harry, despite his intense dislike, basically trusts Snape. He clearly does. If he didn’t he wouldn’t get so angry whenever he found some new evidence that Snape might not be someone he should trust. He doesn’t want to trust Snape, but he does. That was fine to this point. For Voldemort, it meant that Snape was doing his job successfully. It was more than explainable, it was desirable when Snape was playing double-agent. Now that his cover is entirely blown with the order, it would be disastrous for any of them to seem to trust him. Such trust would be proof of Snape’s loyalty to Dumbledore. Voldemort is paranoid, he couldn’t possibly fail to see this, leaving him to wonder A) What is so important about Draco that Dumbledore would die to save him and B) Is Dumbledore really dead? Not to mention questioning how Snape might be acting against him right now. If Snape is truly loyal to Dumbledore, it is imperative, right now, for everyone to believe that he is not.
Last note. There’s a persistent theory that Dumbledore is in fact, not dead. I don’t believe it. More than anything else, Fawkes’ mournful song clinches it for me. Dumbledore is dead. Let’s hope he knew what he was doing.
And One Last Wild Theory Concerning McGonagall
This has been added entirely after my second recent reading of the book. It seems that there's a very vocal fandom contingent right now who believe that McGonagall is really the traitor. It was after reading so many iterations of this theory that I decided I really needed to go back and read books 1 & 2, because I certainly couldn't find anything to support the idea in books 3-6.
I still haven't. The theory goes something like this. Somebody must be a traitor. It's not Snape for some variation or combination of the theories outlined above and a few others that I didn't use. It's somebody that everybody trusts without hesitation. Everyone trusts McGonagall. McGonagall isn't a warm motherly figure with Harry. McGonagall must be evil.
They'll then pick apart a few of the scenes where they believed that she was being unusually harsh on Harry, and harp on and on about her lack of maternal care for him. I'll say this, those instances are certainly there. She can be very hard on Harry. She expects a great deal from him, and that sometimes means she has to be harder than you might expect on him. She's also not at all the maternal type. She isn't that way with anyone. Besides which it would be redundant. Rowling already gave Harry a substitute mother in Molly Weasley. He doesn't need another. He does need a disciplinarian who isn't Snape. She is that person. She's not cold, or at least not any colder to Harry than she is to anyone else. I just see no evidence that she's anything other than a slightly severe older woman. Also, I don't really think people are invested enough in the character for it to be a huge deal if she ends up evil. It might come out of left field, but nobody will really feel terribly betrayed or hurt that this beloved character was a bad guy. If someone unexpected ends up being a traitor it has to be someone that the average fan has a real emotional investment in. I just don't think McGonagall is that person. If anyone sees it and thinks they can explain to me where this evidence is, I'd love to hear it.