Subject: Indeed.
Author:
Posted on: 2015-01-09 18:02:00 UTC
Long were my journeys through strange lands, like Bunyoro and the Palace of Ewuare. Indeed, I have a slideshow of my travels availa-
*is tackled to the ground, the slide projector falling into a conveniently placed Portable Hole*
Well then.
Also, I'm really happy to be back. As I said, hopefully I can be less of a colossal bell-end this time. =]
So. Who wants to present fan theories on their favorite works of fiction? Doesn't matter how huge or minor the theory is, how crazy, or how obscure the fandom is. Bring 'em in.
And hey, I actually have one from A Song of Ice and Fire that I thought of myself.
Readers of this series: You know the one-eared black tomcat that's hanging around the Red Keep? I think I know his name: Balerion. I believe that the cat that wreaks petty (ha) havoc on Robert's court is Rhaenys' kitten, all grown up and angry at the people that killed his owner. Of course, he's just a cat, so he can't do much more than irritate people. He is a significant nuisance, though, and he does attack ravens... I wonder if that means anything... naaaah, couldn't be!
The light-creatures from In the Forest of the Night - the Here, according to the subtitles - are Vashta Nerada.
Both species have a strong connection with trees - the Vashta are ubiquitous in arboreal environments, while the Here identify themselves as the lifeforce or spirit of trees. Both are nearly-invisible specks in the air, not pulled down by gravity. Both are capable of rational thought, at least in large numbers, but can't communicate except by convoluted methods (memory chips, psychic crazy girls). And, of course, the episode titles of 'Forest of the Dead' and '(In the) Forest of the Night' are pretty close together.
Yes, the Vashta Nerada were malevolent, while the Here protected the earth - but both acted in response to a threat to their habitat. In the Library, they were living in processed wood, which can't have been very comfortable for them if they're intimately connected to trees. People wandering around reading the books was a threat to them. Back on Earth, the solar flare would have wiped them out; they weren't protecting humanity per se, so much as their own ecosystem.
And of course there's one other related species (in the new series): given another five billion years of evolution, the Vashta Nerada will learn to inhabit and 'awaken' the trees they're linked to. Ultimately, their line will lead to the Forest of Cheem, and to Jabe, who was present when the sun finally overwhelmed the Earth.
hS
Perhaps they spread and spread through time, carried in someone's book back far into the prehistory of the earth... back to when the Ents were "awakened". Just a thought. =]
They did claim to have been Here all along, after all.
If they were created with Arda, then when Yavanna awakened the Ents it would've been by force-evolving the Vashta Nerada to the 'make a tree sentient' stage. Huorns are then explained by Ents sharing their VN with normal trees, and taking back non-evolved VN in trade - the trees become more Entish, and the Ents become more treeish, exactly as Tolkien described.
And of course we know that the 'Entish' trees still exist today - there's one on the grounds at Hogwarts, isn't there? (In fact, isn't that a willow? Do... do we know for sure that it's not Old Man Willow? I'm sure we could jig the map to place the Old Forest in Scotland if we tried...)
(...)
(... someone please confirm that there exists Old Man Willow/Whomping Willow slash)
hS
On the other hand, a DW/HP/LotR crossover based solely on trees? Dude, sign me up!
It's more of a perspective piece than an actual story, but what did you expect when the main character is an ephemeral collection of mindless specks who only gain intelligence when in large numbers?
hS
I've found the story hidden in the 'Vashta Nerada mythology'; so I guess I'll be writing that instead? Once I figure out the timelines...
hS
Coming to you live from the dimmer recesses of my brain and bits of a mostly-forgotten physics education, may I present:
The magic of Harry Potter is actually a quantum field effect with observable results in a macro-scale universe.
Hear me out on this. The Potterverse is a strange, strange place at the best of time, but one of the more consistent bits of weirdness is the idea - patently wrong - that "Muggle technology" doesn't work at Hogwarts. Okay, I get that J.K. probably meant "Muggle science" by that (which doesn't really work either, unless - ah, but that's a discussion for another day), but she used a specific term and I'm running with it.
See, Muggle technology does work in the Wizarding World. We see the great spinning gear setups and locking-bars of the vault doors at Gringotts - mechanisms that work in harmony with magical defences, including whatever the Thief's Downfall is and a dragon (of the non-literal-five-headed variety). Hagrid has a dirty great crossbow firing bolts the size of a small tree, and crossbows (even hand-draw ones) are complicated bits of kit. The Flying Ford Anglia seems perfectly content in the grounds, though I'm not too super-duper sure that that one counts since it's kept going by magic kind of sorta maybe a bit but the headlights work and guh weird.
So, we know that mechanical stuff works. We also see in the films that Luna's knackered Converse (her trackie bottoms tucked in socks, alas, remain unpictured; anyone getting that reference deserves prizes) don't dissolve or anything, so we can safely assume that modern materials like plastics and so forth aren't subject to the effects. However, I'd wager that with the advent of portable electronics - presumably battery-operated torches, Walkmans, boomboxes, digital alarm clocks, and so forth, I mean, it's set from the early-Seventies to mid-Nineties - stuff started going haywire. Why?
Field interference.
See, if we look at magic as an observable phenomenon able to be replicated under laboratory conditions, which it is, assuming there's a wizard in the lab, it becomes obvious. "Magic" is some sort of deeply weird quantum field - and since every field has an associated particle, that's what is interacting with the electronic artifacts brought into Hogwarts by Muggleborn students. If we also assume that magic particles - which I'll call "thaums" for convenience and because I, like everyone else here, am a colossal nerd - act like neutrinos, permeating the world around them and passing through like it ain't no thang. However, they disrupt other fields... like the electromagnetic field, for instance. Like the one you use to read this and parse it into knowledge, also known as brain activity.
Major disruptions would probably cause strokes and so forth, but there's going to be a subset of people who can use it for some biological advantage. But that brings up the old saw of "Why isn't magic evolutionarily selected for?" To which I respond: see previous sentence. Perhaps the rates of strokes and brain damage and so forth were too great in those hypersensitive to this field - something that, even after the advent of effective medical care (which, for all its faults, the Wizarding World got to long before the Muggle one did) - meant that for the longest time, the trait was simply unprofitable from a genetic standpoint. But then someone figures out a healing spell, and everything changes.
BTW, healing spells and stuff that directly affects living matter, like transfiguration? I'd wager that was the first stuff to be discovered... though probably after some kind of proto-Killing Curse. People are warlike. I haven't got that much more to say on that, tbh. It doesn't interest me
Now, though... now there are effective treatments. It's like a genetic defect that people live with, like a tendency towards sickle-cell anaemia or something, it just happens to come with the side effects of flying broomsticks and magical creatures (which I accept this theory does little to explain, though I'd wager they came first). Magic users are, through good old genetic altruism, allowing other magic users to survive and thrive, getting a hold of their powers so that their heads do not a splode. Perhaps that's what Merlin was, the last of the really sensitive wizards. Perhaps magic's slowly coming back, finding a level between Muggle and "Ka-Boom Oopsie There Go My Eyeballs" that's suitable for further recreation.
There's an awful lot of perhapses here, but I think it's okay.
Also, this is wobblestheclown, rebranded and revamped and hopefully less of an angry tosspot this time around.
=]
Well, most people don’t think of wedges and screws as "technology", but where did you get "Muggle technology doesn't work at Hogwarts" anyway? I only remember Hermione saying 'All those substitutes for magic Muggles use – electricity, and computers and radar, and all those things – they all go haywire around Hogwarts, there’s too much magic in the air' (GF 28). Since computers and radar and, by extension, "all those things" use electricity, Hermione apparently doesn’t believe that non-electric Muggle technology doesn’t work at Hogwarts.
I always wondered whether Hermione got this wrong, JKR didn’t think it through, or this is a deliberate setup for a future change in Muggle-wizard-relationships.
If Hermione got it wrong or was misled by Hogwarts: A History, which is not always accurate, the teachers may have set up some anti-electronics charms to prevent "Gaming Boys" and "Walking Men" disturbing their lessons and distracting the students from their homework.
If magic interferes with electricity, then every electric device is a crude magic-detector. Muggles would realize that such things like cell phones don’t work in certain areas of London (around the Ministry of Magic, and probably St. Mungo’s). Muggle scientists wouldn’t think of magic, but they would investigate, and find periodic fluctuations correlated to rush hours (when hundreds of employees apparate to or from the MoM). Since sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, and sufficiently researched magic is indistinguishable from science, in the end it wouldn’t matter whether the scientists call spell casters "wizards" or "human sources of anti-electronic quantum fields".
Does the MoM monitor scientific publications? Would they be aware of such research and try to stop it? Even if some scientists were obliviated, the accumulated data would still be there and could be found by other scientists. What do wizards know about sensor networks, cloud computing, and the world-wide web? To prevent Muggles learning about magic, the wizards would need to learn much more about Muggles, so either way their relationship would change.
I never considered that using magic might interfere with brain activity in other ways than deliberately casted spells, but now I think that you are on something there.
Dr. rer. nat. Hieronymus Graubart, future Nobel prize candidate for discovering the mathematics of magic. (Not really. "The Mathematics of Magic" already exists, but since it is a novella by L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt, it is called "Arithmancy" in the Potterverse.)
I was fairly certain it came up across the series that magic and electronics don't mix, but the thing is, wedges and screws are technology. A simple lever is technology. It's something artificial that does something the human body cannot do.
Also, this might just be me, but I've seen plenty of fics where magic just stops any and all technology from working. It's at the to the point where I wonder if the authors have got the wrong Harry.
Personally, though, I was thinking that once Muggles caught up - about now-ish would be a pretty good bet for that to happen, or at least in the next decade or so - to the point where the Statute of Secrecy was pretty pointless, they'd just get rid of it. Part of the reason for it given by a few people (I forget exactly who) is that Muggles would constantly badger them for magical solutions to Muggle problems, which seems plausible until you realise that just makes you a race of fantastic washing-machine repairmen. Magic can do so much more than that, and I reckon that once the Statute DOES come down (I have no idea how well Unplottable landscapes show up on satellite imaging, but it's probably not a risk anyone wants to take) then a lot of Muggleborn wizards and witches will take part in research programs. If nothing else, it's more beer vouchers for uni. =]
As an aside, given that Arthur Weasley is supposed to be a foremost expert on Muggle tech at the Ministry's Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office, I think we can safely say that they're not exactly getting copies of physics journals in the letterbox. For one thing, they tend to be fairly weighty things, and frankly that'd be animal cruelty. =]
Wedges and bolts are technology. I wondered whether JKR may have said in an interview that magic and Muggle technology don’t mix, because she said a lot of nonsense when she didn’t have time to think about it, or to look up which subplots only existed in her mind and which had actually made it into the books.
As far as I’m aware, Hermione’s retort to Harry’s suggestion that Rita "The Bug" Skeeter might have "bugged" Hogwarts is the only canonical reference to "magic and electronics don't mix". Fanon may have blown this up to "all technology stops working when magic is involved". I wouldn’t know. I actually don’t read much fan fiction. Rereading the books and filling the plot holes is more satisfying.
"Muggles would constantly badger them [us] for magical solutions to Muggle problems." That would be Hagrid (translated from Hagrid-speech) answering Harry’s question in Chapter 5 of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. I read this as JKR’s way to avoid mentioning witch hunts in a children’s book. Witch hunts are only brought up in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, meant for a slightly older audience, and even then in a humorous way. I’ve always seen the Statute of Secrecy as an act of humanity. It was the only way to make Muggles forget that magic is real, so that they no longer burned each other based on wrong accusations. And that’s the problem with Muggles catching up – are we really so much more reasonable nowadays?
Unplottable regions and satellite imaging, electronic magic-detectors, Muggles catching up, wizards trying to stay hidden, or wizards abandoning the Statute of Secrecy – so much potential for fan fiction set in the twenty-first century. I suppose it’s mostly unused, and all we get are next generation regurgitations of the original series?
HG
Though part of that may simply J.K. not really wanting to write near-future SF - or not considering herself equipped to do so. Which is fair enough, as far as I'm concerned; she's made her millions, she has a new project in the form of the Cormoran Strike series (underrated, IMO, but I love a good 'orrible muuuuuurdah)... maybe it's best left to us?
There's also potential for a far-future fic, though inevitably you'd get reviews from anime cognoscenti calling you a rip-off of the admittedly excellent To The Stars, which you should definitely read if you have even a passing familiarity with Puella Magi Madoka Magica, and frankly, if you don't, read it anyway. Delicious musings on the presence of AI in society that I won't be able to get anywhere else since Iain M. Banks has died.
There are constant (well, maybe not constant, but a few) references to characters checking their watches while at Hogwarts. The most notable example I can think of is how Harry mentions his watch stopped working after doing the Second Task.
I'm pretty sure there's also a mention of Ron looking at his watch in the first book (outside the portrait of the Fat Lady when telling Hermione she'd better not make them late for the duel) and probably other references I'm forgetting.
Also, the magical community has been seen using enchanted clocks (like the Weasleys'), magical watches (like Dumbledore's), enchanted cameras (like Colin's, the one Lockhart's photographer used, the one Rita Skeeter's photographer used...) and the radio (in the form of the Wizarding Wireless). It can also probably be inferred that they use enchanted printing presses to run off copies of the Daily Prophet. I feel like the Omnioculas ought to be mentioned as well, since they're basically ramped-up binoculars.
We can safely assume that all the watches were using clockwork, which we know works (cf. Gringotts). A digital watch would probably, well, I don't want to think about wearing malfunctioning electrical equipment close to my skin. I'll stick to moisturizer, thanks.
And while we know that technological artifacts can be enchanted - indeed, people doing that is why Arthur Weasley has a job - the Wizarding Wireless Network is a weird one. Normal radios work via a piezoelectric crystal, so perhaps there's a magical equivalent... or perhaps there doesn't need to be and we're all radically overthinking this. =]
Anyway, wouldn't clockwork watches, theoretically, be able to be taken apart, dried, and put back together in working condition? Unless Harry either wasn't able to do that or didn't know how... Maybe he wasn't able to; it's implied in the first book that he repaired his own alarm clock (since I highly doubt the Dursleys would get it fixed for him).
If the Dursleys wanted Harry to get up on his own, so they didn’t need to wake him, they better had this clock fixed. If they didn’t want this, why did they buy him an alarm clock in the first place?
The repaired alarm clock rang at six o’clock the next morning in PS/SS 3 is apparently the first time this clock is ever mentioned. When, where, and how was it broken? Maybe the Dursley’s didn’t buy it for Harry; it was an old spare clock they had lying around and it needed to be fixed because it had been out of use too long? Did Harry get it only when he moved into Dudley’s second bedroom? I cannot find this clock’s back story. Has it been edited out because the chapter was too long?
A random fourteen years old boy would probably not have the skills, tools and knowledge to put a wrist watch back together in working order, even if he could take it apart. A horologist could have done it if he got to it before the parts became too rusty, but Hogwarts students cannot go see an horologist every day, even if there is one in Hogsmeade.
Where did Harry get this watch? In PS/SS 2, Harry lay in his dark cupboard much later, wishing he had a watch. Madam Malkin’s robes are not magical; they are just out of style in the Muggle world. There may be a horologist in Diagon Alley who sells old-fashioned Muggle clockwork watches. Clearly magical devices, like one or both of the Weasley’s clocks and probably Dumbledore’s watch may have their own, unique back stories and may not be purchasable at Diagon Alley.
Collin Creevey’s Muggle parents may have bought him a magical camera at Diagon Alley, if the teacher who explained the Hogwarts letter to them realized that Collin is an enthusiastic photographer and thus warned them that his electronic camera wouldn’t work at Hogwarts. But it seems more plausible that Colin brought an old-fashioned photochemical Muggle camera. Since he said ‘if I develop the film in the right potion, the pictures’ll move’ (CS 6), I assume that all the magic is in the potion, and everything would work well, only the persons in the pictures wouldn’t move, if Collin used the usual Muggle developer chemicals.
But now thinking about it, Collin may have needed a magical, non-electronic flash for taking pictures inside the castle. Or there may be more magic in this magical developer potion than just making the persons in the pictures move. Wait, Lockhart’s photographer uses a flash at Flourish and Blotts. Is it magical or a very old-fashioned Muggle flash? I’m not very knowledgeable in this field, but the smoke from burning powdered magnesium should probably not be purple, so the wizards use something else?
Omnioculars and things like the Wizarding Wireless are probably like Alastor Moody’s artificial eye or the autonomous Snitch drone: Powered by Magic, we are not supposed to think about how it works.
HG
That the flash mentioned in Chamber has a magical element to it, which may well be what causes it to move; the whole point of a flash is to illuminate a scene, so it makes sense that wizards would find a way to do it better since they're far more used to working with light thanks to spells and suchlike... and because wizards are an incurious bunch, they settled for refining the powder rather than using something else.
Also, you're forgetting the Occam's Razor solution that Hermione uses on Harry's glasses all the time. A simple Reparo will clear up a clockwork watch no end, and because there's no planned obsolescence in something like that (you literally cannot do that in a society that fixes things by magic), stuff like big fob-watches become status symbols - hence why wizards give watches as coming-of-age presents whereas Muggles get, Iunno, a car or something, my parents don't like me much so I haven't got a frame of reference.
Also also: one L in Colin Creevey. Enjoy your mini! =]
As far as I remember, we have only ever seen Reparo mending things that were literally broken into pieces. I assume that it is a simple spell and cannot do more. Harry’s watch becoming wet and then becoming rusty is a more complex damage and would require a more complex spell, if there even is any. Oh, and an attempt to magically reassemble the watch after taking it apart would probably result in all moving parts sticking together, because that is what Reparo does.
To clarify the potions comment: I tried to suggest that the magical developer potion would not only make the persons on the pictures move, it would also magically increase the film's photo-sensitivity, so that Colin could get good pictures in a room lit only by candles. But this assumption doesn’t work, because Lockhart’s photographer, who would presumably use the same magical developer potion, apparently had some kind of flash on his camera, and I don’t imagine that Hogwarts corridors are lit brighter than a book shop.
Thank you for catching Collin the mini-Aragog. He probably spun his webs all over the notes on my hard drive. I’m going to cleanup now.
HG
that Colin said if he developed the picture in the right potion, the people would move.
"That the flash mentioned in Chamber has a magical element to it, which may well be what causes it to move"
So... yeah.
And if Reparo could have fixed Harry's watch, why would he complain that it was broken? Perhaps he didn't think of it...
And the adorable one.
And the best one.
And the - oh, you get the point. =]
Anyway, she's the one who does all that because she's the one who remembers all those spells. She's only not leading the entirety of wizardkind in a quest for the secrets of magic because a) world optimization just ain't her style and b) because book-learnin's status-capped in the Potterverse. If it wasn't, the heroes would all be Ravenclaws. =]
See, Harry's The Special, and Hermione's my fluffy little nerd Jesus, but Ron's just a normal wizard teenage boy from a normal wizard family, suckered into a quest to help his best friend and crush (Hermione belongs with Tonks btw it is canon in my books no shut up J.K. totally added addenda to that effect in purple felt-tip pen) and not doing because he was destined to or anything like that, but because it's the right thing to do. And he struggles with it, and he isn't always heroic, and that's what I find appealing about him. Ron's a person, a person with flaws and values and weird internal biases, not a heroic archetype. I think this is probably what gets fangirls (particularly Harmony shippers) so utterly furious about him.
That and he's a filthy ginger. =]
One day, the dark one will choose a foe,
A special one marked with lightning, as you know,
Will find the Horcruxes in their hidden refuges spread around.
And with a noble army at the helm,
This Master Wizard will thwart the Dark Lord and save the realm,
And be the greatest, most interesting, Most important person of all times.
All this is true, because it rhymes.
I thought you'd pulled it from a badfic or something. And then I saw the last line. :D I'm a derp.
I feel so terrible whenever I find Weasley-bashing fics because Ginny, Ron, and (bizarrely) Mrs. Weasley get the brunt of it.
Why is it so hard for people to realize Ron is Harry's friend because he's a genuinely nice guy, and Dumbledore is most certainly NOT paying them to be his friend, Ron is NOT trying to steal Harry's inheritance, and Ginny is NOT SLIPPING HARRY LOVE POTIONS OF ANY KIND! *pant pant pant*
Yes, Ron can be immature. Yes, he can be insensitive. But the thing is, save for the times when he and Harry (or he and Hermione) fought, his words were never intentionally cruel. His heart has always been in the right place; he just sometimes needs a little help to realize it.
*raises toast to Ron*
To Ron.
Of all the wizards I ever read about, to paraphrase Star Trek, he was the most... human. =]
Long were my journeys through strange lands, like Bunyoro and the Palace of Ewuare. Indeed, I have a slideshow of my travels availa-
*is tackled to the ground, the slide projector falling into a conveniently placed Portable Hole*
Well then.
Also, I'm really happy to be back. As I said, hopefully I can be less of a colossal bell-end this time. =]
The mild one: Mia from Power Rangers Samurai has anosmia/hyposmia--extremely decreased or nonexistent sense of smell. This is why she is so bad at cooking. Her sense of taste is skewed and she doesn't notice when her food is burning because she can't smell the smoke.
The crazy one: Tommy Oliver is a paradox. A few years after he started as a Ranger, the Wizard of Darkness (a minor villain) created a clone of him, which ended up getting sent back to the 1700's. Since it was created through magic, this clone was immortal and unable to age, and was thus the same man who became the legendary White Stranger in 1880.
At some point in the late 20th century he was adopted by the Olivers, and returned to Angel Grove, where he proceeded to get turned into Rita Repulsa's evil Green Ranger. Eventually he was turned good, and the bad guys started trying to get rid of his powers. Eventually they got to the point where using his morpher was dangerous--the power drain started him aging normally.
First and foremost, Pinkie Pie is able to warp reality the way she does (being places before Rainbow Dash, pulling stuff from behind her back, et cetera) because the Element of Laughter is a hybrid of harmony and chaos magic.
My reasoning is as follows:
--Pinkie's reality-warping shenanigans tend to happen in hilarious ways and/or where they'd further a joke. Discord, while (mostly) malicious, uses his chaos magic the same way.
--Pinkie and Discord are the only two characters "shown" to have Offscreen Teleportation and awareness of the fourth wall (enough to crack it), two things considered impossible for normal ponies. (Discord's not a pony, but the point stands.)
--Neither character has a real explanation for why they can do all of that beyond "that's just who they are." If anything defies explanation, it's chaos magic.
--Discord was clearly (as seen in the flashbacks in "Twilight's Kingdom") around at the time of Star Swirl (or whenever the Elements were created), who's to say he didn't have a claw in their creation?
We know that both Bill and Percy Weasley got twelve OWLs. Probably Barty Crouch Jr. also got twelve OWLs, although Barty Crouch Sr. may have talked about something he wishfully imagined. There may have been more unknown students who got twelve OWLs, and there should also be students who failed some OWLs, but had originally started to study twelve subjects in their third year. Why, then, did Hermione Granger need a Time-Turner in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, if it wasn’t just for conveniently having time travel available when it was needed?
There are seven obligatory subjects: Astronomy, Charms, Configuration, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Herbology, History of Magic, and Potions (not counting Flying, because this is only for the first year). In Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Chapter 14, Neville asks about Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, and Percy talks about Divination, Muggle Studies and Care of Magical Creatures, giving us a total of twelve subjects for the third year. Do we really know all optional subjects, or may there be at least one neither Percy nor Neville mentioned?
In Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Chapter 4, Hermione shows Harry and Ron the books for all optional subjects: Arithmancy, Care of Magical Creatures, Divination, Study of Ancient Runes, Muggle Studies – and there she is conveniently interrupted by Ron. This is such a common trope that it practically shouts “There’s another optional subject not mentioned yet! Prepare for future surprises. “
In Chapter 6 of the same book, Ron tries to discuss how Hermione’s classes for Divination, Muggle Studies and Arithmancy are at the same time on one day. Hermione reacts so annoyed that Ron never dares to discuss what else he might have seen on her timetable for other days. In Chapter 16, we see that Hermione has to sit double exams for Arithmancy and Transfiguration at Monday morning, and for Charms and Ancient Runes at Monday afternoon, but then Harry and Ron just give up and don't look at the other days, because there isn’t any point in asking how she’s going to do this. Is it possible that JKR deliberately avoided showing us full timetables because she knew that there had to be a sixth optional subject somewhere, but she had not yet decided what it would be?
We never see Hermione’s full timetables in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire either. Could JKR still not think of a plausible sixth optional subject, that wouldn’t be covered in other classes? Or did she forget that she had never actually said what it is?
In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 31, at the last morning of the OWL examinations, Harry sits in the common room, reading through the notes he had borrowed from Hermione. After the Astronomy examination, Hagrid’s sacking and the aftermath at the previous evening, Ron is sleeping long. But wouldn’t sleeping long like Ron be out of character for Hermione? Shouldn’t she be right there, sharing her notes with Harry to prepare for the examination in History of Magic? Where is Hermione if she isn’t sitting another exam for the still mysterious sixth optional subject?
In Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 5, Harry, Ron and Hermione receive their OWL results. Hermione got ten "Outstandings" and one "Exceeds Expectations". Since she gave up Divination and Muggle Studies when she returned the Time-Turner, Hermione had tried to do something that had never been accomplished before: studying thirteen subjects during her third year.
So there is a good reason for giving Hermione a Time-Turner. No, it’s not for letting her try to get thirteen OWLs. It’s for teaching her these important lessons:
Magic cannot do everything.
Your Heart’s Desire may always be out of reach.
Even if you can add some extra hours to your day, it’s still impossible to learn everything that can be learned.
Addendum 1:
Uh, what? A newer edition of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince says that Hermione got only nine "Outstandings"? Did somebody complain that eleven OWLs for Hermione is WRONG and should be edited, because this would require her to have started studying thirteen subjects while there are only twelve subjects available?
Fanon says that time travel isn’t really such a big secret and everybody who studies more than ten subjects at Hogwarts gets a Time-Turner. This theory is very popular because people just love to use time travel in their fan fiction. JKR tried to shoot it down on Pottermore, saying that time travel is really very dangerous and really top secret, and that Hermione was really the only student who ever used a Time-Turner at Hogwarts, but nobody believes her. That’s what you get when you listen to your readers and throw years of planning and deliberately writing around the mysterious subject out of the window because after so many years you don’t remember why the plot of your second book requires Hermione to get eleven OWLs in the sixth book.
Unfortunately the Department of Inaccuracies, even if it existed, can’t do anything about this.
Addendum 2:
Look, Ron, it isn’t too difficult. It took me only ten years, and I didn’t even lurk on Hermione’s timetables. BICIMTG is "Basics of Interspecies Communication: Introduction to Mermish, Troll and Gobbledegook".
It’s sufficiently magic, not covered in other classes, not requiring an additional teacher we have never seen, and Hermione never talked about it because she was just too curious whether Ron would ever figure it out on his own. (Thanks to Julia H. of the Harry Potter Lexicon Forum for suggesting that Professor Dumbledore could teach Mermish and probably also other languages.)
HG
when I expose you to My Pet Theory, Part 2: The Time-Turner Conspiracy.
Would McGonagall give a very dangerous and top secret Time-Turner to a thirteen year old student just to make her happy and let her have all the OWLs she wants to get? Certainly not!
Would McGonagall give a very dangerous and top secret Time-Turner to a thirteen year old student to teach her a specific lesson? I don’t think so.
But since time travel was so top secret, McGonagall couldn’t even know how this would end when she started it. She only knew that Hermione tried to sign up for every subject available. Then, something like this must have happened (Warning! Scripted badfiction copypasted from a several years old discussion thread):
DUMBLEDORE: You seem concerned, Minerva. Is there a problem?
McGONAGALL (presenting a piece of parchment): I am, Albus. I am and there is.
DUMBLEDORE (reading): So she couldn’t decide and signed up for everything. Is this a surprise?
McGONAGALL: I had hoped – this will never work, Albus! For two years we show our Muggle-born students how much can be done although Muggles deem it impossible. We convey that much more will be possible if they only work hard, but now I have to tell Miss Granger that her Heart’s Desire cannot come true because it’s impossible to fit into the class schedules!
DUMBLEDORE: But this isn’t the first time you have to do this, right?
McGONAGALL: In these other cases, I found something I could refer to. If Miss Granger had ever experienced a situation where magic was available but couldn’t help, we would know. Why should she believe me?
DUMBLEDORE: I’m sure Miss Granger will not assume that you intent to hurt her, or that you are just too lazy to do your work right. So what do you expect?
McGONAGALL: I would be less worried if she were more predictable. For months she is every teachers dream, but suddenly Miss Granger tries to catch a troll on her own. Or she helps Mr. Potter in a prank involving a fake dragon. Last Yule she tried to transfigure herself into a cat! (aside) Why didn’t she ask me first?
DUMBLEDORE: I don’t pretend to understand everything that happens in this school. Miss Granger’s escapades may have better reasons than we know. But I can see your point.
McGONAGALL: Albus, isn’t there a way to show, rather than tell Hermione, that this is really impossible? Otherwise I can’t foresee what this refusal might do to her mental health.
DUMBLEDORE: There is no way as far as I’m aware, but I will think about it and I may ask for advice. If you excuse me now, I have some letters to write.
--- scene break ---
McGONAGALL(reading a letter): Did you know that the Ministry is actually researching time travel?
DUMBLEDORE: How could I know? Everything done at the DOM is top secret.
McGONAGALL: So your friend suggests using a Time-Turner to let Miss Granger take two lessons at the same time. Wouldn’t this be dangerous? Nobody is supposed to change history!
DUMBLEDORE: Since Miss Granger would just do what she already intends to do, she wouldn’t really change anything. There shouldn’t be much danger.
McGONAGALL (reading out loud): Since nobody yet considered that there should be a law prohibiting the use of Time-Turners by under-aged persons or outside of the DOM, this would technically not be illegal. Ha! Your friend is a Slytherin, right? But this should still be kept secret, and for my own safety in case of a breach of security, I need sincere affirmation that your student is an honourable person dedicated to her studies who will strictly limit the use of this Time-Turner to educational purposes only. Didn’t you tell him that this girl’s unpredictability is the main problem?
DUMBLEDORE: So the crucial question is: Do we trust her?
McGONAGALL: I wouldn’t even trust myself. There may always be a situation when you can save a life by doing a minimal adjustment to what just happened – so what would you do?
DUMBLEDORE: I’ll try to get all information about previous experiences with Time-Turners. Miss Granger has to know exactly what can be done and what shouldn’t be attempted. Then I’ll trust her to do nothing unreasonable. And it’s ‘her’, by the way.
McGONAGALL: What? Oh, this signature is as unreadable as you would expect from an ‘unspeakable’. But don’t try to distract me. This is all quite illogical. If we depend on Miss Granger being reasonable anyway, wouldn’t it be better to just tell her that she can’t study more than twelve subjects?
DUMBLEDORE: Not at all, Minerva, not at all! You warned me that this may be a turning point in Miss Granger’s life, and you know quite well that even well-thought decisions may have terrible consequences. Why would you take a risk?
McGONAGALL: Because we have to take a risk anyway! I just want to point out that it may be better to abandon this unnecessary complex project.
DUMBLEDORE: Maybe, but when did we ever miss such an opportunity to experience something new? How long do you reckon will Miss Granger need to learn her special lesson? I’ll bet she’ll hand the Time-Turner in before the spring holidays arrive.
McGONAGALL: Bet? Albus, this isn’t a game!
DUMBLEDORE: Life is too severe to take it always serious.
-------------
Their speech patterns and behaviour may be out of character, but I hope their attitude isn’t.
HG
I realized something about the Others and the chidren of the forest. They're not elves; they're fairies.
How do I figure? They're the Courts Unseelie (winter) and Seelie (summer) respectively.
Also, on Howland Reed: I think he represents the old gods, in the same way that Melisandre and Aeron respectively do for the Red and Drowned Gods. Deeply religious, hugely magical, a true connection with his gods (he's a crannogmen, so he knows the secrets of the children), and (more directly related to Melisandre), he has some connection with one of the implied Princes that were Promised (namely Jon Snow). Regardess of whether Jon is Ashara/Brandon's son or Rhaegar/Lyanna's, Howland knows who he really is.
...yeah, I might be anxious to meet this guy in the books.
I think Reddington isn't Liz's father- he's only ONE of her fathers. He and Liz's adopted father were lovers at one point.
Totally nuts, I know. >_>
As for why Lupin never contacted Harry to see how he was doing, I'm fairly sure Dumbledore made Harry's location not only a secret, but protected him from being found by anyone, regardless of their intentions. That would also explain why Harry never seemed to get any fanmail.
More specifically, he's the tiny fragment of Sauron's power left after the Ring was destroyed, plus whatever he's managed to (slowly and painfully) accumulate in the six thousand years in between.
The proof:
-They both rule over orcs/goblins.
-They both rule kingdoms which are supernaturally attuned to them - Mordor is evil because Sauron lives there, and the Labyrinth is merged with Jareth to the point that his face keeps showing up in the scenery.
-Jareth uses songs as magic (mostly 'As The World Falls Down' and 'Within You', though the latter failed). Sauron comes from a world literally created by magic singing.
-Jareth's all about Words of Power ("Say your right words, the goblins said..."). Sauron, again, comes from a setting where saying the right words is one way to invoke (innate) power ("Naur an edraith ammen! Naur dan i ngaurhoth!").
-They both try to trick people into saying powerful words - Sauron attempts to convince Finrod and Beren to swear "Death to light, to law, to love! Cursed be moon and stars above!" to prove they're really orcs. That would not have been a good idea.
-They both have an unhealthy obsession with specific brunettes - Luthien and Sarah.
-They both have far-viewing crystals.
-They both have the power to change people into goblins - Jareth implies it'll happen to Toby, while Sauron may well have been involved in the original creation of orcs from elves.
-They both have an unhealthy obsession with shiny things - Sauron and the Rings, Jareth and, uh, endless glitter.
-They both transform into flying creatures - a vampire for Sauron, a barn owl for Jareth.
-Just look at them:
Yeah, the Dark Lord is trying the whole 'Hi, I'm pretty and I bring you presents, just call me Annatar Jareth' thing again. And once again, he gets taken down by a girl. ;) Serves him right.
(Does this mean Hoggle needs to go on a quest to throw a bag of glitter into the Bog of Eternal Stench? I think it rather does)
hS, bringing the crazy ^_^
I know, I know - you thought he was all about the gold. And yeah, he likes the pretty jewellery as much as anyone. But Smaug is actually a vigilante anti-hero: righter of ancient wrongs, punisher of the guilty for their heinous crimes against dragonkind.
In the First Age, when Melkor still ruled as rightful king over Middle-earth, the dragons had their beginning. The greatest among them were Glaurung the Golden - the Father of Dragons - and Ancalagon the Black, first of the winged variety. Smaug, of course, must be descended from both of them, since he's winged (and a dragon); he also clearly identifies with Glaurung, since he's adopted the same aftername - 'the Golden', or 'Glóren' in Sindarin.
In all the years of the First Age, there were two occasions when dragons were defeated in major battles. First, when Glaurung fought in the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, he was driven back to Angband in disgrace by masked dwarves. Second, when Ancalagon sallied forth in glory in the War of Wrath, he was brought down in ruin by the bearer of a Silmaril.
So imagine how Smaug feels when, after millennia of brooding on these ancient wrongs, he hears that a mountain full of dwarves (Glaurung's bane) have dug up a glowing jewel bearing more than a passing likeness to the Silmarilli (Ancalagon's last sight). At last, there is a chance to exact vengeance for the great dragons of old - and, along the way, to burn down a city of scruffy mortals very similar to the one who (wearing a dwarven helm, mark you) slew Glaurung the Golden himself.
And so Smaug the Avenger flew down from the North in flame, and all burned before his righteous wrath.
hS
I have a whole bunch of headcanons about most of my fandoms! Some are more crazy than others.
One Harry Potter headcanon that I have has to do with the reason why no one reported for the Dursley's for child abuse. If the obvious neglect and abuse had been reported, he would have been removed from the Dursley's home from the British equivalent of CPS. But then that would have broken the protection that he had from being there- in his mother's family's house- and it would be entirely possible that Harry would be at risk from Death Eaters harming him. My headcanon is that the abuse he suffered was noticed and reported. But the British CPS didn't investigate for whatever reason; probably an obliviate or two, and probably cast by Dumbledore- all a way to keep Harry alive until it was the right time for him to die, after all the Horcruxes were destroyed.
My craziest headcanon is for the Marvel universe. I believe that Age of Apocalypse Blink is really Pixie and Nightcrawler's daughter. Pixie isn't seen in AoA; but both Pixie and Kurt are teleporters. A pink teleporter plus a blue teleporter equals a purple teleporter. Plus, Pixie's pink hair is genetic; her mother has the same hair color, so it's plausible that her daughter will have pink hair as well. Blink also has eyes that are one solid color, just like Kurt. It is also implied that Sabretooth is Kurt's father in the AoA universe; if Blink was Kurt's daughter (and thus Sabretooth's granddaughter) it would explain why Sabretooth took her in.
Those are the two big ones that I can think of at the moment. If I think of any more I'll post them later!
Dunbledore was certainly not above obliviating some Muggles if he deemed it necessary.
But weren’t the Dursleys always so concerned with what the neighbours would think of them? Wouldn’t they have tried to avoid anything that might have been noticed?
Yes, sometimes Vernon lost his temper and tried to beat Harry, so Harry learned to duck and to stay out of reach. But I’m not so sure that Vernon ever actually hit Harry; he may always have missed.
The original protection Harry got through his mother’s sacrifice worked only against Voldemort. But when Dumbledore worked his magic to give Harry extended protection at the place where his mother’s blood dwelled, why would he limit it to Death Eaters and Dementors, risking that some random mass murderer not associated with Voldemort might slaughter Harry and his family? Why would he set any limits at all?
My headcanon: Dumbledore didn’t need such crude spells like Obliviate to make the world go the way he wanted it to go. Having Harry been monitored by Mrs. Figg was mostly to keep track of what happened to Harry when he left the house. Dumbledore had made sure that no real harm could be done to Harry at Number 4, Privet Drive, and that any abuse Harry might have to suffer would only serve to make him stronger and to form the character we know, but would never go so far to make Child Protection come in and make Harry loose the best protection he could have.
Note: I’m not saying that what happened to Harry was not bad, and certainly he perceived it as really bad, but it could have been worse.
HG
Remember how Lupin says that the Dementor's Kiss turns you into "something like itself"? I wonder just how literal that is.
Yep, I think Dementors are a spreading curse. Kissed for too long, you turn into a Dementor.
However, my own headcanon is slightly different.
See, the Dementor's Kiss sucks out your soul, right? There's no real evidence to prove that they eat them, since they "feed" off happy memories. It could just be a reproductive system, in that the soul sucked out undergoes sufficient torment to become a Dementor over time, incubating beneath the shroud of the adult form until such time as it is free to leave and seek new victims, new things to devour, constantly searching for the happiness and warmth of memories now denied it...
Er, er, here'sakitten! Kittenkittenkitten~
Get out of my brain, my fingers, my keyboard, or wherever you are!
HG
