DH:24 - The Wandmaker (Bloomsbury 2007)
Italics are impressions from my first read, when I did not yet know what was going to happen.
1) Tragedy. The first time I read these chapters, it was Dobby that I cried for, and it is possible that his death affected me more than any of the others in this book. But on this reading, my heart is currently too busy aching for Ron and Hermione to give Dobby as much thought. The ordeal at Malfoy Manor was far more dreadful for the two of them than for Harry. The war gave them a punch in the gut, and I'll be you anything that neither of them nor their relationship was the same afterward.
2) "for an instant he knelt again beside Dumbledore's body at the foot of the tallest tower at Hogwarts," Weird mirror, eh? Comparing Dobby to Dumbledore. Echoing Dobby's promise to throw himself from the tallest tower if he failed Harry.
3) Bill: "Ron's taken her inside. [...] She'll be all right." They're comfort-boinking. They need it after what they've been through. Bill understands, after what happened at his wedding.
4) "[Voldemort's] rage was dreadful and yet Harry's grief for Dobby seemed to diminish it." Harry's ability to love shields him from his link with Voldemort. Harry honours Dobby by burying him with his own two hands. Dobby would never have wanted anything more.
5) Harry finally, suddenly figures out Occlumency. Please tell me that I am not the only one who found this lame? Harry was meant to work hard at something that was difficult to master. Instead, he was a lazy slacker about it, and eventually just managed to pick it up by accident. Apparently love is the key. Gosh, that explains why Bellatrix is so kickass at it. :p The "weird, obsessive longing" for the Hallows is somehow gone. I guess that means that feeling was something to do with his connection to Voldemort. Harry's faith in Dumbledore appears to have returned.
6) Luna [...] crouched down and placed her fingers tenderly upon each of the elf's eyelids, sliding them over his glassy stare. "There," she said softly. "Now he could be sleeping." Luna has a tender and almost loving relationship with death, doesn't she? She's sort of other-worldly. Despite the fact that she did not really know Dobby, she is the one who speaks words over him, and gives him the send-off he deserves. Hermione, great advocate of elf rights, is ironically not at the funeral.
7) "the shorter of the two, which felt friendlier in his hand..." Oh, dear. Is there any way for wandlore *not* to sound dodgy?
8) "Here lies Dobby, a Free Elf." *sniff* But since Kreacher reformed, Dobby has become superfluous. Oh, cruel Jo!
9) "his mind full of those things that had come to him in the grave, ideas that had taken shape in the darkness, ideas both fascinating and terrible." Now, there's a ominous-sounding sentence if I ever heard one. It's making me think of the Hero's Journey in miniature. Harry had gone down into the underworld (Dobby's grave) and returned with the elixir (conviction). Hooray for Harry finally having a daring plan!
10) The Weasleys are using the Fidelius Charm. Apparently you can be Secret Keeper for the place where you yourself live. Bill is for Shell Cottage. So WHY was James Potter not his own damn Secret Keeper?! Oh, right. Because there would have been no series. Also, how did Harry get to Shell Cottage and see it without Bill coming up to him and saying, "Bill and Fleur Weasley live at Shell Cottage" or some equally formal announcement?
11) "Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it." You know, I hadn't really thought about it, but CoS is almost as connected to this book as it is to HBP. So many of the important plot elements reappear. This phrase is only one, but there's also the sword and the basilisk venom, and probably other stuff if I could think of it, but I'm all distracted by half-watching Mirrormask right now.
12) "His instinct was telling him one thing, his brain quite another. The Dumbledore in Harry's head smiled ...." Harry's instincts have usually been good, but have occasionally gotten him and his friends into really big trouble. Now, he is putting his instincts aside and trying to think like Dumbledore at last. Hooray! Despite what he has learned about Dumbledore in this book, he knows that the boy who wrote the letter to Grindelwald was not the man he knew as Headmaster and Hogwarts. He still trusts Dumbledore, and so do I.
13) "Am I meant to know but not to seek? Did you know how hard I'd find that?" By trying to see himself as Dumbledore would have done, Harry is learning about himself. Dumbledore wanted him to know about the Hallows, but did not want him to be consumed by the quest. And he decides to talk to Griphook first, and seek the Horcruxes as Dumbledore wished, rather than the Hallows.
14) Ron/Hermione. I love that in this chapter, Ron and Hermione are almost always within arm's reach of one another. They've declared themselves without ever saying a word -- within Harry's hearing anyway.
15) Griphook: "Even amongst goblins, you are very famous." Every time we are reminded of exactly how famous Harry is, I'm always a little moved, because I remember that very first chapter all those years ago, when we were told about people toasting "the Boy Who Lived". That always chokes me up. And Harry has managed to impress this goblin further with Dobby's funeral.
16) Harry: "I need to break into a Gringotts vault." Holy shit! I'm pretty sure I did not see that coming the first time around. I especially didn't expect to see Harry make the statement so baldly. And now we have come full circle from the first book where we were told you'd have to be mad to try and break in. Let's see if three teenagers who can't act or lie to save their lives can do it. He wants to break into the Lestranges' vault. He believes something important may be hidden there.
17) Voldemort is at Hogwarts. A lot of Harry's friends are at Hogwarts. If I were Harry, that would bother me, too. At least Ginny is no longer there, but in hiding with the rest of the family.
18) Wandlore. Harry has Bellatrix's and Draco's wands. Ollivander supplies the important information that when one wizard defeats another, they may claim their wand. Harry has disarmed all kinds of people, but I presume that because he did not claim their wands, the wands went back to their former owners, and did not change allegiance. "An initial attraction, and then a mutual quest for experience, the wand learning from the wizard, the wizard from the wand." Yup, wandlore sounds dodgy. But the upshot is that Harry is now the master of Draco's wand. He took Draco's wand by force, conquering it and bending it to his will. Naughty! *giggle* That ought to keep H/D 'shippers happy in their 'shippy pants. Harry seems to be onto something with the wandlore. He's figured something out.
19) Mr Ollivander. He's all moral ambiguity and morbid fascination, isn't he? He even calls Voldemort "the Dark Lord". I am entirely willing to bet he was a Ravenclaw. He has pale, protuberant eyes, just like Luna. Are they related, perhaps?
20) Harry's wand destroying the borrowed wand was apparently unique. Ollivander has never heard of such a thing, and if he hasn't then who has? But now Voldemort seeks the Elder Wand to defeat Harry. He has traced it to Grindelwald, and now all he needs to know is who could possibly, possibly have relieved Grindelwald of it? Let's think...who do we know who's defeated Grindelwald?
21) Dumbledore's wand. The question Jo always wondered why no one asked her. The question she definitely could not have answered. How did Dumbledore win this *unbeatable* wand in a duel? That's a question for fanfic writers if I ever heard one. Voldemort breaks the tomb and takes the wand, but he has not won it. He never defeated Dumbledore. I guess Voldemort doesn't know the rules.
1) Tragedy. The first time I read these chapters, it was Dobby that I cried for, and it is possible that his death affected me more than any of the others in this book. But on this reading, my heart is currently too busy aching for Ron and Hermione to give Dobby as much thought. The ordeal at Malfoy Manor was far more dreadful for the two of them than for Harry. The war gave them a punch in the gut, and I'll be you anything that neither of them nor their relationship was the same afterward.
2) "for an instant he knelt again beside Dumbledore's body at the foot of the tallest tower at Hogwarts," Weird mirror, eh? Comparing Dobby to Dumbledore. Echoing Dobby's promise to throw himself from the tallest tower if he failed Harry.
3) Bill: "Ron's taken her inside. [...] She'll be all right." They're comfort-boinking. They need it after what they've been through. Bill understands, after what happened at his wedding.
4) "[Voldemort's] rage was dreadful and yet Harry's grief for Dobby seemed to diminish it." Harry's ability to love shields him from his link with Voldemort. Harry honours Dobby by burying him with his own two hands. Dobby would never have wanted anything more.
5) Harry finally, suddenly figures out Occlumency. Please tell me that I am not the only one who found this lame? Harry was meant to work hard at something that was difficult to master. Instead, he was a lazy slacker about it, and eventually just managed to pick it up by accident. Apparently love is the key. Gosh, that explains why Bellatrix is so kickass at it. :p The "weird, obsessive longing" for the Hallows is somehow gone. I guess that means that feeling was something to do with his connection to Voldemort. Harry's faith in Dumbledore appears to have returned.
6) Luna [...] crouched down and placed her fingers tenderly upon each of the elf's eyelids, sliding them over his glassy stare. "There," she said softly. "Now he could be sleeping." Luna has a tender and almost loving relationship with death, doesn't she? She's sort of other-worldly. Despite the fact that she did not really know Dobby, she is the one who speaks words over him, and gives him the send-off he deserves. Hermione, great advocate of elf rights, is ironically not at the funeral.
7) "the shorter of the two, which felt friendlier in his hand..." Oh, dear. Is there any way for wandlore *not* to sound dodgy?
8) "Here lies Dobby, a Free Elf." *sniff* But since Kreacher reformed, Dobby has become superfluous. Oh, cruel Jo!
9) "his mind full of those things that had come to him in the grave, ideas that had taken shape in the darkness, ideas both fascinating and terrible." Now, there's a ominous-sounding sentence if I ever heard one. It's making me think of the Hero's Journey in miniature. Harry had gone down into the underworld (Dobby's grave) and returned with the elixir (conviction). Hooray for Harry finally having a daring plan!
10) The Weasleys are using the Fidelius Charm. Apparently you can be Secret Keeper for the place where you yourself live. Bill is for Shell Cottage. So WHY was James Potter not his own damn Secret Keeper?! Oh, right. Because there would have been no series. Also, how did Harry get to Shell Cottage and see it without Bill coming up to him and saying, "Bill and Fleur Weasley live at Shell Cottage" or some equally formal announcement?
11) "Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it." You know, I hadn't really thought about it, but CoS is almost as connected to this book as it is to HBP. So many of the important plot elements reappear. This phrase is only one, but there's also the sword and the basilisk venom, and probably other stuff if I could think of it, but I'm all distracted by half-watching Mirrormask right now.
12) "His instinct was telling him one thing, his brain quite another. The Dumbledore in Harry's head smiled ...." Harry's instincts have usually been good, but have occasionally gotten him and his friends into really big trouble. Now, he is putting his instincts aside and trying to think like Dumbledore at last. Hooray! Despite what he has learned about Dumbledore in this book, he knows that the boy who wrote the letter to Grindelwald was not the man he knew as Headmaster and Hogwarts. He still trusts Dumbledore, and so do I.
13) "Am I meant to know but not to seek? Did you know how hard I'd find that?" By trying to see himself as Dumbledore would have done, Harry is learning about himself. Dumbledore wanted him to know about the Hallows, but did not want him to be consumed by the quest. And he decides to talk to Griphook first, and seek the Horcruxes as Dumbledore wished, rather than the Hallows.
14) Ron/Hermione. I love that in this chapter, Ron and Hermione are almost always within arm's reach of one another. They've declared themselves without ever saying a word -- within Harry's hearing anyway.
15) Griphook: "Even amongst goblins, you are very famous." Every time we are reminded of exactly how famous Harry is, I'm always a little moved, because I remember that very first chapter all those years ago, when we were told about people toasting "the Boy Who Lived". That always chokes me up. And Harry has managed to impress this goblin further with Dobby's funeral.
16) Harry: "I need to break into a Gringotts vault." Holy shit! I'm pretty sure I did not see that coming the first time around. I especially didn't expect to see Harry make the statement so baldly. And now we have come full circle from the first book where we were told you'd have to be mad to try and break in. Let's see if three teenagers who can't act or lie to save their lives can do it. He wants to break into the Lestranges' vault. He believes something important may be hidden there.
17) Voldemort is at Hogwarts. A lot of Harry's friends are at Hogwarts. If I were Harry, that would bother me, too. At least Ginny is no longer there, but in hiding with the rest of the family.
18) Wandlore. Harry has Bellatrix's and Draco's wands. Ollivander supplies the important information that when one wizard defeats another, they may claim their wand. Harry has disarmed all kinds of people, but I presume that because he did not claim their wands, the wands went back to their former owners, and did not change allegiance. "An initial attraction, and then a mutual quest for experience, the wand learning from the wizard, the wizard from the wand." Yup, wandlore sounds dodgy. But the upshot is that Harry is now the master of Draco's wand. He took Draco's wand by force, conquering it and bending it to his will. Naughty! *giggle* That ought to keep H/D 'shippers happy in their 'shippy pants. Harry seems to be onto something with the wandlore. He's figured something out.
19) Mr Ollivander. He's all moral ambiguity and morbid fascination, isn't he? He even calls Voldemort "the Dark Lord". I am entirely willing to bet he was a Ravenclaw. He has pale, protuberant eyes, just like Luna. Are they related, perhaps?
20) Harry's wand destroying the borrowed wand was apparently unique. Ollivander has never heard of such a thing, and if he hasn't then who has? But now Voldemort seeks the Elder Wand to defeat Harry. He has traced it to Grindelwald, and now all he needs to know is who could possibly, possibly have relieved Grindelwald of it? Let's think...who do we know who's defeated Grindelwald?
21) Dumbledore's wand. The question Jo always wondered why no one asked her. The question she definitely could not have answered. How did Dumbledore win this *unbeatable* wand in a duel? That's a question for fanfic writers if I ever heard one. Voldemort breaks the tomb and takes the wand, but he has not won it. He never defeated Dumbledore. I guess Voldemort doesn't know the rules.