Pensieve Help

[shellsnapeluver]

Okay, don't laugh too hard when I ask this. Because if you do, you shall meet DE!Shell. J/k...

I ask because I do not know.

When a person dips their head into the basin, does the body go all the way into it, or just the head? Like, if someone was in the room watching you view memories, would they see your body, or watch you physically fall into the

Comments

[lariopefic]

Ok, I just reread GoF, so I'm pretty fresh on our first instance of the pensieve. Harry could see into the scene from above, without touching it, as if he were looking down into it from far away, like from a porthole in the ceiling or something. But when his face touched it, he felt as if he had fallen all the way in and landed inside the scene. When Dumbledore came to retrieve him, he actually saw Dumbledore next to him, and Dumbledore seemed to lift him bodily out of the scene. I think that he was still actually present in Dumbledore's office, just as I think he was present when he encountered Tom Riddle in the diary for the first time. (Harry likens the two experiences in GoF). And I think the Dumbledore (because he is Dumbledore) is able to separate his consciousness enough to enter the pensieve memory by touching it, but still maintain enough of his awareness of his body back in the office to take hold of Harry's body and pull them both away from the pensieve silver. So I guess what I'm saying is that I think it's only your mind

[tinytexans]

I would concur... the bootay stays on the outside... oooohhhh.... are you writing Snape watching Hermy's waggling behind as she looks at the pensieve?... Is he gonna spank her!?! :P

[shellsnapeluver]

Booty on outside---got it. So, it's there sticking out, waiting for someone to... well... you know.

Smack it.

or worse.

hehehehehehehehhe. OMG! EVIL PLOT BUNNY!!!!!!!!

[lulabelle72]

Hehe! I got the "other" instance. I quoted to her the section where Harry dips into the Pensieve of Snape's memories when Snape leaves him alone -- remember when he was supposed to be getting Occlumency lessons from Snape? Anyway, he is watching Snivelly get turned upside down, and suddenly, Snape is beside him, gripping his arm. Then they go up into the sky, and Harry feels like he's turned upside down himself. Then they're back on the stone floor of the dungeon.

THAT makes it sound -- his feet hitting the stone floor, especially -- as if Snape went in and pulled him out, bodily. Because if Harry's body was still outside, why didn't Snape just grab his arm and yank? Why go into the memory?

Now I'm changing my original argument to Shell, LOL.

[camillo1978]

When I think of the Pensieve, for some reason I always end up thinking of the secene in Trainspotting where Renton has to recover two supositories from the most filty toilet in the world. In the film they made it into a sort of dream sequence where he dives right into the toilet, swims through a tropical sea and then climbs out of the toilet bowl at the end. It's a ridiculous connection but if you've seen the film you'll know exactly what I mean (and if you haven't seen the film it's worth a watch).

However, I reckon it's more likely that your body stays put, with your head dipped in the Pensieve, and your mind is the thing that goes walkabout ;-)

[shellsnapeluver]

Yeah, body stays put. Well, that's just no fun! hahahahha, thank you camillo!

[mimimanderly]

The body stays in the room; it is merely the mind that "tumbles into" the scene. Harry's mind INTERPRETED Snape as being in the scene with him, next to him, gripping his arm. In reality, Snape was merely next to him in the dungeon, viewing the same scene and grabbed his arm. The mind has ways of interpreting things to fit into its view of reality. A person entering the room and seeing someone using a pensieve would simply see someone standing over the basin with their faces a hair's breadth away from the surface.

[shellsnapeluver]

See, the way you put this is lovely... "their faces a hair's breadth away from the surface"

The way I put this...

The head is buried in a bowl, with the ass sticking out waiting for some lurker to do naughty things to it...

[redskyatnight76]

I definitely agree with camillo and mimimanderly; you just dip your face in and stay standing on the floor. It's your mind that enters the memory, but you feel like you're there - rather like being in a dream. You know how if you've just started dreaming, or are just dropping off to sleep, and something suddenly wakes you and feel as if you sort of drop or fall, almost as if you've been floating and you've fallen back on to the bed? You've been on the bed all the time, but because you go from your dream state, in which you're standing somewhere, to your real state, in which you're lying in bed, so very suddenly, the mind tricks you into feeling as if you've fallen. This is what I imagine it's like to lift your face from the Pensieve.

[shellsnapeluver]

Yes, I agree too. Although, there are such strong arguments that it is the other way too... But you are right--the way a dream is, the way it makes you feel... yikes! gives me creeps! I love that feeling though!! hahhahaha, I'm strange, I know.

Thank you, my Red.