(no subject)
I was reading some Harry Potter Fan fiction and I was struck again by how many writers have the students return to Hogwarts to retake their seventh year. This has always amazed me, because I could not believe that anyone who'd fought in a battle, and carried the bodies of their dead friends to safety would want to climb back into the womb to go to High School again. I also was surprised that no one considers that students might not want to spend extra time in a place where they had been tortured and their friends had been killed.
I aso had assumed that the war would have continued as mopping up after Death Eaters not killed or captured in the battle would need to take place. I was sure that many of the DA would want to be part of that action, Neville especially, because the Lestrange brothers appeared to be at large at the end of the book. (Bellatrix wasn't the only person responsible for the attack on his parents.) I was very pleased that JKR thought like I did and said that Neville, Ron, Harry and many other DA continued to fight in the war. That seemed to me to be the only logical outcome of the events in the story.
But I wanted to comment on one thing that struck me. All these writers assume that the students learned nothing in their seventh year at Hogwarts, as if the only way to learn was by listening to lectures and reading books. Wouldn't the students have mastered a lot of Defense Against the Dark Arts by protecting themselves against the Carrows and the Dark Arts which saturated the school? If a student who'd had to defend himself from the Carrows, Crabbe and Goyle, assorted Dementors and other Death Eaters for a year and who'd fought Death Eaters in the only battle against them in modern history couldn't pass the Defense Against the Dark Arts NEWT then the test was the most worthless thing devised by man. Wouldn't the actions of the DA in the school have employed advanced use of Charms, Potions and even Transfiguration? How else were they wandering around at night without an invisibility cloak or a marauders map if they didn't use Disillusionment charms or Polyjuice potion and who knows what else? Wouldn't the activities of the DA have required the use of advanced magic? Didn't the fact that they held their own in a battle with wizards who scared the adult world into submission be a sign that they had some expertise?
I find it amusing that actual use of learning is viewed as so unimportant.
(The fact that students as dull as Crabbe and Goyle could preform Disillusionment charms, the Cruciatus curse and cast Fynde fire implies that some teaching was going on.)
I aso had assumed that the war would have continued as mopping up after Death Eaters not killed or captured in the battle would need to take place. I was sure that many of the DA would want to be part of that action, Neville especially, because the Lestrange brothers appeared to be at large at the end of the book. (Bellatrix wasn't the only person responsible for the attack on his parents.) I was very pleased that JKR thought like I did and said that Neville, Ron, Harry and many other DA continued to fight in the war. That seemed to me to be the only logical outcome of the events in the story.
But I wanted to comment on one thing that struck me. All these writers assume that the students learned nothing in their seventh year at Hogwarts, as if the only way to learn was by listening to lectures and reading books. Wouldn't the students have mastered a lot of Defense Against the Dark Arts by protecting themselves against the Carrows and the Dark Arts which saturated the school? If a student who'd had to defend himself from the Carrows, Crabbe and Goyle, assorted Dementors and other Death Eaters for a year and who'd fought Death Eaters in the only battle against them in modern history couldn't pass the Defense Against the Dark Arts NEWT then the test was the most worthless thing devised by man. Wouldn't the actions of the DA in the school have employed advanced use of Charms, Potions and even Transfiguration? How else were they wandering around at night without an invisibility cloak or a marauders map if they didn't use Disillusionment charms or Polyjuice potion and who knows what else? Wouldn't the activities of the DA have required the use of advanced magic? Didn't the fact that they held their own in a battle with wizards who scared the adult world into submission be a sign that they had some expertise?
I find it amusing that actual use of learning is viewed as so unimportant.
(The fact that students as dull as Crabbe and Goyle could preform Disillusionment charms, the Cruciatus curse and cast Fynde fire implies that some teaching was going on.)