HP 40 Day Challenge: SS Chapters 11-17

[potterdelphia]

There is so much to post about from yesterday's reading of Sorcerer's Stone for the hp40challenge as I finished the book last night! Hooray! Chamber of Secrets begins today, which I've already started on the bus into work this morning.

Enough of that... onto my thoughts! Be warned: if you did not read the entire series to date, you may be spoiled. I reference many things that come later, if I think I come across a clue or forshadowing.


Chapter 11: Quidditch

1. Thank goodness for Hermione! Harry finally catches up on his homework and studies, now that Hermione is a lot more friendly once she's relaxed a bit on the whole rule-breaking issue. She even congures a bright blue fire in a jam jar so the Trio can study outside. At the first Quidditch match in the next scene, she also charms the banner Dean Thomas painted to flash different colors. Both spells seem to be pretty tricky magic for a first year student from a Muggle family with only two months of classes behind her.
2. Snape limps across the courtyard and takes Harry's Quidditch through the Ages, claiming that library books aren't allowed outside the school. When Harry enters the staff room to ask for his book back, he finds Filch attending to Snape's mangled and bloody leg. Why didn't Snape go to Madame Pomfrey? Surely she must also be aware of the Sorcerer's Stone.
3. Hagrid mentions that no student could bewitch Harry's broom, which is not under his control any longer. A powerful wizard must be tampering with Harry's broom, and there is more to broom enchantments that flying spells if only a dark wizard could interfere with it. Hermione immediately turns to our dear Severus. She runs to the staff bleachers, knocks Quirrell down, and sneaks behind Snape, too deeply involved with a spell to notice he's on fire. Hermione is so convinced that Snape has it in for Harry, she doesn't realize the spell is broken after she knocks Quirrell over.
4. The Trio now tells Hagrid their theory about Snape's run-in with Fluffy, believing he is after the Sorcerer's Stone. Hagrid insists that Snape would never try to kill a student (notice he specifies student!) and accidentally spills the beans about Nicolas Flamel. Wow, Hagrid really is not that discrete, is he! And several times it's been mentioned how much Dumbledore trusts him. It's quite possible that Dumbledore knows all about how much information the Trio now possesses.

Chapter 12: The Mirror of Erised

1. "The lake froze solid and the Weasley twins were punished for bewitching several snowballs so that they followed Quirrell around, bouncing off the back of his turban." LOL indeed! Once you know that Voldemort is hiding out on the back of Quirrell's head, this small scene is just hysterical.
2. Christmas at Hogwarts! This year Harry receives proper presents from several people-even the Dursleys find it in their hearts to give in to the spirit of the season and send Harry a fifty-pence piece. Much nicer than Vernon's old socks! Do they give him a real gift this year so they won't look bad to other people? Hagrid whittles Harry a wooden flute, which comes in mighty handy for use against Fluffy. Another convenient gift is James' invisibility cloak that Dumbledore secretly leaves for Harry. "Use it well" the note instructs.
3. Speaking of the invisibility cloak, Harry can go anywhere in the school, and he chooses the library? Granted, the Trio is still researching Nicolas Flamel, but I wonder if any other eleven-year-old boy would have immediately sought out information about a wizard in the school's library.
4. If the forbidden corridor guarded by Fluffy seemed too easy to Alohomora open, how can we explain the completely unlocked classroom that acts as a hiding place for the Mirror of Erised? Harry just walks right in and checks it out. Harry sees himself standing with all of his family, his dead mother and father in particular, while Ron finds himself standing alone, best of his brothers as Head Boy and Quidditch Captain. Dumbledore claims he sees himself with a pair of thick, woolen socks. Harry wonders if this wasn't a flippant remark to a deeply personal question, but think about it: how could a man like Dumbledore see anything else? He tells Harry he is now prepared if he ever runs across the mirror again, implying that he knows he will.
5. And, another nerdy grammar mistake I noticed: Dumbledore explains to Harry that "this mirror will give us neither knowledge or truth." [Emphasis mine.]

Chapter 13: Nicolas Flamel

1. Hermione expresses horror at Harry being out of bed in the middle of the night, crying "if Filch had caught you!" However Harry was caught-by Dumbledore himself, the school's Headmaster. The students are clearly more afraid of Filch than of Dumbledore.
2. Oh, Neville! He hops into the common room, the sad victim of Malfoy's Leg-Locker curse. He is very upset by this, but seems more concerned about Malfoy's comments that Neville isn't brave enough for Gryffindor House. Harry quickly allays his fears, telling him he's "worth twelve of Malfoy" and that the hat chose Neville for Gryffindor, while Malfoy got stuck in "sticking Slytherin". Now Harry feeds into the stereotype that Slytherin is not the house with which any sane person would want to be associated.
3. After the Trio learns the identity of Nicolas Flamel and correctly deduce that the Sorcerer's Stone is hiding beneath Fluffy, Harry get the "horrible feeling that Snape could read minds", although according to Snape in Order of the Phoenix, it isn't so much mind-reading as interpreting the thoughts from inside someone else's mind. Snape practically confesses that he realizes Harry's up to something when he tells Quirrell that students aren't supposed to know about the Sorcerer's Stone.
4. Also in Snape's conversation with Quirrell, he threatens the stuttering professor by informing him that he needs to "decide where [his] loyalties lie". Harry infers that Snape is attempting to forcing Quirrell to explain how to get past his enchantment on the Stone's hiding place.

Chapter 14: Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback

1. The Trio visit Hagrid in his hut, as he refuses to discuss Flamel and the Stone around other students; there they learn that after a game of cards in the pub the night before, Hagrid won a Norwegian Ridgeback dragon egg. Only problem is, after a few days and the egg finally hatches, Draco Malfoy also learns about the dragon! He taunts Ron about it after Ron seeks medical assistance from Madame Pomfrey after baby Norbert bites him on the thumb. While Malfoy has plenty of evidence on Hagrid and the illegal dragon, including a letter from Ron's brother stating the plans, he does nothing about it, until the night Charlie Weasley's friend arrive to pick up Norbert. He delights in the fact that he has evidence over someone else, knowing he can use it at any time, but chooses against it.
2. Charlie must be a great older brother if he's willing to help Ron and company get rid of an illegal dragon. Although Charlie doesn't actually enter the scene at this point, we can guess a lot about him character from this alone. Really, can anyone see Percy willing to perform a favor such as this?
3. Where is Hogwarts security? Hermione tells Harry and Ron time and time again that no one can apparate onto school grounds, and there are all sorts of security measures in place. Yet four of Charlie's friends can easily fly their broomsticks to the tallest atromony tower and harnass a dragon between them.

Chapter 15: The Forbidden Forest

1. Neville sneaks out of bed in the middle of the night to warn Harry that Malfoy knows about the dragon and plans to get him into trouble. Although McGonagall-and in turn, Neville-believes the dragon story to be a fabrication designed by Harry to get Malfoy into trouble, Harry realizes that Neville is a true friend, as it must have taken tremendous courage to sneak out in an attempt to help Harry. This loyalty of Neville's makes a recurring theme through the series.
2. Harry, Hermione, Neville and Draco have detention in the Forbidden Forest with Hargrid-their task is to help Hagrid find an injured or dead unicorn. Malfoys complains; he thought they would just be copying lines. This sentence leads to two thoughts: 1) Malfoy may have had additional formal schooling before attending Hogwarts, as this is a punishment given by teachers usually for misbehaving in class; 2) this subtly forshadows the scenes in Order of the Phoenix when Umbridge forces Harry to write "I must not tell lies".
3. When Harry, Malfoy, and Fang come across the dead unicorn, Harry remarks it's "beautiful and sad". Through the centaurs, Harry learns that the innocent are the first victims, and, although Firenze doesn't directly come out and explain, that Voldemort is seeking to come back into power and steal the Sorcerer's Stone. Harry takes this to mean that Snape is Voldemort's servant.
4. Professor McGonagall's-and in turn, Hermione's-distaste for Divination first shows through here, as she dismisses the centaurs warnings as fortune-telling, which is, according to McGonagall, a very imprecise branch of magic.

Chapter 16: Through the Trapdoor

1. Ron and Hermione are scared, but Harry is terrified and has massive nightmares. Of course Ron and Hermione are frightened-how could they not be?-but the reality of Voldemort is not real to them. Harry's more involved, his parents were killed, he's been scarred! When he tells his best friends that he's going after the Stone, Ron calls him mad and Hermione fears he'll be expelled. "So what?" Harry cries; his speech here reflects the tone of the rest of the series, specifically his need to protect others, even at the cost of himself. It's only dying a bit later than I would have," Harry explains to them, "because I'm never going over to the Dark Side!"
2. Hermione, the smartest witch in the class, forgets her head a bit when faced with a huge amount of stress; she recognizes the Devil's Snare and realizes how to defeat it, but worries that there's no wood! Ron yells "Are you a witch or not?" Here we see another example of that blue fire that Hermione seems so skilled at creating. Later, when Ron needs to be taken by the white players in the giant chess game, Harry and Hermione balk. Ron demonstrates his bravery and loyalty by telling them that sometimes you have to make sacrifices. But it still boggles my mind: how can three first-years get past all sorts of enchantments set forth by talented Hogwarts professors?

Chapter 17: The Man With Two Faces

1. Oh Quirrell, it was you all along! Unwrap that turban to reveal Voldemort and, like all good evil villians, explain to us how you did it.
2. Quirrell thinks that Snape was a rather good candidate for the bad guy, and tells Harry that Snape and James hated each other while in school. Was the Snape/James rivalry that legendary for Quirrell to know about it, or did he witness it first hand?
3. Right here in this chapter, Voldemort tells us practically the same thing that JK spelled out in an interview with Emerson and Melissa: James' fight was courageous but he offered Lily a chance to live, and she choose to protect her son.
4. Once Quirrell and Voldemort are defeated, Dumbledore takes Harry to the hospital wing, where he wakes up three days later. When Harry mentions Flamel, Dumbledore comments "You did do that thing properly, didn't you?" implying that he knew all along that Harry and company were working towards solving the mystery. Ron and Hermione later ponder over this implication, but Harry observes that Dumbledore knows just about everything that goes on at Hogwarts-he knew James sneaked off to the kitchens in his invisibility cloak to steal food!
5. Two great quotes from Dumbledore in this chapter, that really need no other comments:
   
   • "To the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure."
   • "Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself."
6. Ron gets some sorely needed recognition from one of his older brothers (Percy is extremely proud of Ron) and Neville excels at Herbology!