Why didn't Dumbledore expose Tom after Myrtle's death? A reconsideration
For several years (after gradually, reluctantly losing all faith I once had in Dumbledore), I’ve accepted that the most likely reason Dumbledore didn’t reveal Tom’s youthful crimes, expose him as a...
View ArticleVanishing Cabinets
Rowling and her overpowered, plot-breaking one-book wonders...This is thanks to Jodel and her speculations on the Vanishing Cabinets in her essays “Minding the Gap” and “O, the Times Are Out of...
View ArticleThat one time the Ministry for Magic was really on top of things
Fred and George’s defense contract is one of those really interesting hinted-at subplots which is never followed up on. Disappointing for many reasons, but right now, let’s look at the timing. Harry...
View ArticleLucius at the Quidditch World Cup
What was Lucius doing when masked, hooded figures were torturing the Roberts family? Harry asks Draco if his parents are out there in masks, and Draco smirks and says he wouldn’t say if they were. He...
View ArticleTunnels
Another question occurred to me while pondering whether and when Tom had access to the Vanishing Cabinets connecting Hogwarts and Borgin & Burkes: did Tom know about all the school’s secret...
View ArticleTransferred Some of His Powers
Dumbledore says that Voldemort transferred some of his powers to Harry, the mechanism for which is later revealed to be the soul fragment lodged in Harry’s head. But the only power he ever singles out...
View ArticleWhat kind of order is the Order of the Phoenix?
I’ve always ignored the first part of the name of Dumbledore’s special group. “Phoenix” is interesting: Dumbledore’s familiar, connected to his interest in immortality, and possibly also connected to...
View ArticleHow magical are most wizards?
Trying to line up the contradictory statements throughout the series about average magical ability into something coherent is probably a lost cause, but I'll give it a shot anyway.Based on Harry’s...
View ArticleWas Harry's year unusually small?
I must be on a "lost causes" kick this year...I accepted for years that Harry’s year must have significantly fewer students than normal, because (a) he was conceived at or at least right before the...
View ArticleDid Voldemort plan to set Regulus up?
Kreacher tells us that Regulus joined the Death Eaters when he was sixteen. Which at first sounds unimportant. After all, Draco too (if we accept Harry’s prejudiced jump to that conclusion—but let’s do...
View ArticleDoes Dumbledore really give second chances because he believes the best of...
I know, there's an obvious, cynical answer to this one. But I'm curious how it holds up under somewhat-methodical examination.Snape sells Bellatrix and Narcissa the line that Dumbledore’s weakness is...
View ArticleWhat Lucius Knew About the Diary
...and when he knew it.I was reading through the comments to one of Terri’s old fics, and got sucked back into the probably-irresolvable tangle of questions about what Lucius was really planning during...
View ArticleThe Decline of Pagan Magic
Though the movies contradict the books too often for me to consider them canon, occasionally, a background detail is useful. One is Bathilda Bagshot’s book On the Decline of Pagan Magic, a movie prop...
View ArticleFluffy's new home
I was searching Accio-Quote for something else entirely when I stumbled across a reference to Fluffy's whereabouts after Year 1:[Y]ou tend to find at Hogwarts that, erm, anything that's dangerous ends...
View ArticleHeritability of Potterverse Magic
All right, I've been kicking this idea around long enough. Time to let everyone else tear it apart and see what comes of it!IntroductionI’ve seen several attempts at constructing a mechanism for the...
View ArticleSirius and those bikini posters
For a long time, I saw Sirius’s posters of Muggle women in bathing suits as a typical teen thing, with irritating his parents by sticking the posters on permanently (permanently for wizards with no...
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Expecto il padrino
A bit of silliness.I stumbled across the blog post "The meaning of Expecto Patronum: From Hogwarts to Ancient Rome," which discusses the meaning of "patronus" in ancient Rome, and notes that a patron...
View ArticleHow did the wizarding public know Voldemort's powers were broken on Halloween?
I was trying to think of a reason for a rebounding Killing Curse to make Voldemort’s body disappear (no luck so far) when I thought of an entirely different question: with no body and no witnesses...
View ArticleFriendly with the local barman
One bit in the memory of Voldemort's job interview that has always bothered me is Dumbledore's statement that he knows which Death Eaters are waiting at the Hog's Head because he's friendly with the...
View ArticleAllies the Order never made
We hear of several Order members’ missions—mostly unsuccessful—to convince various groups not to join Voldemort, and perhaps fight him instead. Remus tries “reasoned argument” with the werewolves,...
View ArticleThe Cunning-Man and the Hopping Pot
Even before the Statute of Secrecy, there was pressure from both the magical and Muggle worlds against being publicly known as a witch or wizard. However, lots of magical families probably made their...
View ArticleSince he didn't blame the mailer daemon...
Prisoner of Azkaban does a good impression of being one of the best-constructed books of the series, as long as you are willing to smile and nod at time-travel shenanigans (which you pretty much have...
View ArticleDTCL community backup
There is a chance that sites hosted in Russia won't be accessible from outside Russia at some point in the near future. LiveJournal is hosted in Russia. Not in Russia: me, and probably a lot of other...
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We're all backed up at dreamwidth, should the worst happen to LJ. Thanks gingerbred for the kind tuition!
View Articlefantastic beasts and the secrets of dumbledore
• Our focal character has now shifted from Newt to Dumbledore. Frankly, I approve. Jude Law's wheelhouse has always been self-loathing, repressed, posh boys; whereas Eddie Redmayne's gurn has long...
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