Philosopher's Stone Chapter Seven
The Sorting Hat
*McGonagall is in emerald green. Nothing to do with Slytherin. It is in memory of Lily Sue.
*The Entrance Hall is bigger than Number Four Privet Drive, but that may be worked out according to the rules of JKR arithmetic :o
*Hogwarts is all marble and gold until you get down to the Slytherin and Hufflepuff nether regions! Who could plumb those depths?
*Each house is like Hogwarts extended family! Ermm JKR’s ideas about family can be pretty twisted so best not to say more. But rest assured that from this day onwards, these eleven year olds will be exalted, condemned or dismissed as insignificant for the rest of their lives. To paraphrase the Dumblesnore from the Very Potter Musical: “basically I’ve been putting everyone who looks like a good guy in Gryffindor, everyone who looks like a bad guy in Slytherin and the rest can do whatever they want, I don’t care...”
*That McGonagall tries to seem impartial about the merits of each house shows why Dumblesnore would never have allowed her to introduce little Harry to the magical world.
*The points system is really strange and arbitrary as we will see. It’s appropriate that the House cup will no longer seem to matter to anyone after Prisoner of Azkaban.
*Ron doesn’t know about the Sorting Ceremony despite having five brothers who have been through it! What sort of a household are the Weasleys that they let him think it really involves wrestling a troll/something painful?
*Ugh! Can’t Hermione ever be silenced? You know in the sense I mean.
*A pretty neat piece of magic to turn a teacher’s wig blue. I wonder why the school blamed Harry for it.
*No one, including those from magical households, seems prepared for the arrival of ghosts.
*The Fat Friar recognises that the kids must be new pupils - Nick doesn’t it would seem - and wishes they all get sorted into Hufflepuff! So he wants them all to be consigned to the scrap heap of history? How would Ginny 2.0 have reacted to that aspersion? Can the bat bogey hex be cast on a ghost?
*The sandy haired boy currently has no name, but he will eventually rise to the status of local colour/ background noise and tired stereotype.
*Oh shut up Hermione, you’re ruining the moment of our marvelling at the ceiling.
*The sorting hat fits a stereotypical template. It is always dirty no matter what, just as Tom the Barman is always a gummy walnut who never changes, Filch is always in the same state of decrepitude unchanging as the years go by.
*The Sorting Hat Song: Certainly “nerve” and “chivalry” are what one should always expect from eleven year olds...! For crying out loud...
*Hufflepuff here is defined by being just and loyal and industrious and in Order of the Phoenix it will be clarified that JKR considers this to be the dump house ie that these qualities are completely worthless in her opinion.
*It may be most instructive if the Hat just made it clear that Gryffindor house is the elect and no one else matters. So it should just define Gryffindor and only Gryffindor with a rhyme of this kind:
“They’re the elect!
The select!
They rule while the rest all drool.”
Concise no? But maybe not great verse!
*Those kids who are now going into Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw are being dismissed as non-entities by all and sundry.
*Bulstrode however is damned forever. Here, Harry is still too polite to point out to the reader that she is monstrously ugly. In the Potterverse you can tell right away that if anyone’s physical appearance is described as unfavourably as hers is, then they are a designated villain.
*OK, how on Earth does Hermione get sorted into Gryffindor? It really does make the existence of Ravenclaw House completely pointless. I suppose she must be JKR’s self-insert at this point who gets to be one of the elect by authorial fiat.
*Poor Neville will be the resident comical buffoon for some years to come.
*Malfoy gets sorted into Slytherin instantaneously. It is the most telling sign that he is the *designated* local villain.
*Well Hagrid’s scare tactics about Slytherin House work as Dumblesnore expected. The Hat can see that although Harry’s head is largely empty it does at least complain a shard of Slytherin mystique so he could be best suited to the house. But it just does what the author wants it to in the end.
*Yes Fred and George you’ve got Potter... um, yay? Percy will come to regret shaking his hand eventually. He’ll become a designated villain through not being a Potter fanboy.
*Wow, Hagrid was still sober for Harry’s sorting! That deserves a double thumbs up of and in itself.
*Voldemort and Quirrell are as inconspicuous as they are in A Very Potter Musical. An idea typical of the Dark Lord we see in Deathly Hallows - dumping a sheet over himself and he is concealed, not realising the Machiavellian Dumblesnore knew all about his presence at Hogwarts all along.
*I wonder what the Weasleys would have done if Ron had not been sorted into Gryffindor? I’m betting none of them would have congratulated him then. In fact, Percy seems to be the only one who does congratulate him for successfully being on of the Elect. For the rest it was just something they expected and demanded of him. The anticipation made Ron “pale green.” Wonderful system, this Sorting isn’t it? Putting so much pressure on eleven year olds and passing final judgement on them for all their achievements to date as if they have already lived the prime of their lives...
* Dumblesnore’s not pleased to see all the kids, he’s only pleased to see that Harry is in his house and ready to be fattened up like a pig for the slaughter.
* Great speech Dumblesnore. It’s more informative than some of your monologues that last pages.
*Dumblesnore already knows all about Harry’s frugal childhood and delights in it. Truly Hogwarts is the closest thing Harry has to a home and it is both Voldemort AND Dumbledore between them who have contrived it.
*Ah this newer UK edition has also *belatedly* caught JKR’s special arithmetic where she wrote that Nick had been dead for nearly four hundred years when his Deathday was actually 499 years ago. The UK edition now reads, “I haven’t eaten for nearly five hundred years.”
*Sir Nicholas de Mimsy Porpington is a name that indicates another of JKR’s tired stereotypes, this time of the old aristocracy.
*Nick is a true Gryffindor! He enjoys showing off physical injury. He should have a story of recklessness to go with it.
*Slytherin have been on a winning streak in the pointless house cup for a while now. Since point scoring and deductions is so arbitrary it must be down to sheer luck!
*Harry only notices the ghost because Draco Malfoy is next to him. The Bloody Baron would be utterly forgettable otherwise, but Malfoy has conferred some kind of distinction on him. Malfoy certainly holds a fascination for Harry... How much has Harry stared at him since the Sorting?
*Just as well you didn’t ask the Baron why he is bloodied Nick, his backstory is pointless and really uninspired.
*Harry will always love treacle. Good to know there are some consistent points in the Potterverse :p
*I expect Mr Finnigan was shocked to learn that his wife was entitled to braindamage/mindwipe him with complete impunity as soon as she felt so inclined.
*Neville doesn’t mention he is pureblooded here, but perhaps JKR hadn’t thought out his background yet. Here she seems to be trying to make the magical world a larger than life place where it is acceptable to dangle kids out of windows in the manner of Michael Jackson, but she gives up on that approach after the first book. However, the series still gets progressively more bizarre as it goes on.
*Hermione is particularly interested in how to cause brain damage and permanent disfigurement using magic. Not about turning matches into needles!
*I wonder what Voldemort was thinking when Harry felt his scar twinge? He was probably thinking how uncomfortable the silly turban was.
*Dumblesnore acknowledges that there are a lot of death traps set up around Hogwarts. They each pose a high risk of some terrible mishap or other. And to think some have doubted that Dumbledore is a Gryffindor! What’s the fun in life without pointless risk?
*Oh oh, it’s the school song. Does JKR really want it acknowledged in fanfics that it was her creation?
*I wonder if any Slytherins would join in the school song?
*Fred and George fawning before Dumbledore is excruciating. As if the old coot deserves to be humoured...
*Dumbledore is probably tone deaf.
*Enter Peeves. JKR likens him to a chronic plumbing problem, but has also says he is an indestructible spirit of chaos that entered the castle and cannot be eradicated. Still at least he presents an extra risk for the Gryffindors, they ought to be happy.
*There is never any reason given as to why Peeves is so afraid of the Bloody Baron. I suppose when JKR was starting the series it seemed to make sense in that a poltergeist resembles a ghost and the Baron was the scariest ghost, but the Baron is completely deconstructed in Deathly Hallows by his lame backstory.
*Harry dreams about Malfoy and Snape until Voldemort intrudes on the dream and makes it a nightmare. Is Malfoy or Snape the dreamier one?
*It is of course impossible to transfer to another house. The decision of an old hat on that evening when you are eleven decides your destiny irrevocably.