August 8, 2005 4:40 pm

HP #7 Speculation

:note:

I found some awesome commentary on Harry Potter book #6 and speculation about what might happen in book seven. Beware of spoilers – this is for people who have already read the book and are wishing to discuss it! Or maybe masochistic people who enjoy having things spoiled for them. Either way.

The Spoiler Thread and Theories and Spoilers. Both are great; I had a lot of fun reading the first one.

My thoughts will be behind the “read more” link just in case anybody hasn’t finished reading it yet. :)

:star:

I talked to JessicaRabbit at length about the possibility of Harry being one of the Horcruxes (her idea, not mine) and at first it made perfect sense. After thinking about it now, I’m not so sure. After our conversation, I remembered a line from Book #6 where Dumbledore tells Harry explicitly that he thinks Voldemort was intending on making Harry a Horcrux but it didn’t work:

“[Voldemort] seems to have reserved the process of making Horcruxes for particularly significant deaths. You certainly would have been that. … I am sure that he was intending to make his final Horcux with your death. As we know, he failed.” (page 506)

What I still like about that theory is that it could be the reason Harry has extraordinary powers similar to Voldemort’s – the ability to speak Parseltongue etc. – the Horcrux thing didn’t work, yet it still transferred some of Voldemort’s powers to Harry.

Also, part of the downfall of the “Harry is a Horcrux” theory is the fact that Harry would have to sacrifice himself in order to fully rid the world of Voldemort – hardly fodder for a children’s book. Committing suicide? Even for a righteous cause? I somehow doubt parents would be overjoyed about letting their kids read that. It’d be a valorous move on Harry’s part, but I just don’t know if Rowling would do it.

Another speculation I like is the possibility that Dumbledore and Snape had a pre-arranged agreement that (if absolutely necessary) Snape would kill Dumbledore to protect Harry and uphold his (faked?) alliance with Voldemort. It makes sense to me, considering the fact that Dumbledore petrified Harry presumably so that he wouldn’t interfere with a pre-arranged agreement. It’s explained more eloquently in the comments on the first link, but I feel that Snape was trying to protect Harry (and Draco, actually) by upholding his double-agent status. Dumbledore and Snape were both very skilled at Legilmency, so they could have been saying anything to each other right before Dumbledore was killed. It’s not like anybody else would have known – Harry is notoriously bad at Occlumency.

I guess a lot of people are upset with the amount of silly romance in book six; I thought it fit. Ron and Lavender were the epitome of obnoxious 16-year-old couples. Harry and Ginny getting together was cute. *shrugs* I didn’t really have a problem with it.

I’m finding I totally love the HP Lexicon site. It explains everything. Very helpful.

Oh, and I think RAB has to be Sirius’ brother, Regulus Black. He just sort of disappeared and was rumored to have been killed by Voldemort. If he was the one that found the Horcrux, and the weird potion stuff is supposed to eventually be lethal, that explains Voldemort “killing” him (he did it with the potion). And since he probably didn’t do it alone, someone suggested he took Kreacher with him. It makes sense to me, since masters of house elves can order them around.

There’s also the fact that in Order of the Phoenix there was “a heavy locket no one could open” at Grimmauld Place. I’m just sure it was the Horcrux. It follows that the locket would still be in the Black family’s possession, which got turned over to Harry after Sirius’ death. This could explain the reappearance of Mundungus Fletcher in book six – he was stealing stuff, remember? What if he stole the Horcrux? I hate to think of where it could be now.

Just my random thoughts on the issue. ;)

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6 Comments

  • Callie says:

    Voldemort transferring powers into Harry, he wasn’t trying to *make* Harry a Horcrux, he was using Harry’s death for the *process* of making a Horcrux. Although, the whole thing about Harry being able to know Voldemort’s thoughts/actions would account for some of that.

    But that theory you have, about Regulus Black, and the mysterious locket, and stupid Fletcher… hmm… I think you definately may be on to something. And it would make sense to have a house elf with him… the boat wouldn’t hold two full wizards.

    Stupid Fletcher.

  • Paul says:

    Meggan, you’re a freaking genius. I bet you’re right about the RAB thing. Also if you look in book 3 when sirius writes harry a letter and it appears in his handwriting. RAB’s handwriting is fairly similar to it. And I don’t know any kind of factual basis for this, but I think that family member’s handwriting tends to be similar. I know my handwriting and my dad’s is almost identical. But yeah, I still think that Snape is somehow on the side of the Order of the Pheonix. Perhaps his actions were from a prearrangement with dumbledore. Or, and this is my theory, maybe snape made an unbreakable vow to dumbledore many years ago when he defected from the death eaters. But he also made the same vow to protect draco, so perhaps the actions he took were the only possibility for him to uphold both vows. I think this is true because dumbledore always trusted snape even though he couldn’t read his thoughts because if he ever broke the terms of the vow he’d die… so snape = living. snape = order of the phoenix. Bah im rambling now, interesting stuffs.

  • Meggan says:

    Callie:
    Ah. You make sense. I’m a little fuzzy on Horcruxes, but re-reading that quote I quoted (ha.) and what you said clears it up a bit – Harry didn’t have to be a Horcrux, he was just going to be the death that would facilitate making a Horcrux. This opens up lots of possibilities (yet still retains my theory that that’s why Harry has some of Voldemort’s powers).

    Now I’m curious what would have been in Godric Hollow (where Lily and James were staying at the time) that Voldemort would have wanted to make into a Horcrux… The only clue I have is that “Godric Hollow” is named for “Godric Gryffindor,” which would sort of fulfill the “something from every house” thing Voldemort seems to have going. Hmm.

    An emphatic yes about the two wizards thing. Somebody on one of those sites suggested RAB took Dumbledore with him – no way! Not only would the two-wizard thing not work, why in the world would Dumbledore have gone back with Harry? Just dumb.

    Paul:
    I agree about the handwriting running in families. Daniel’s brother Paul’s handwriting looks almost identical to their dad’s, my handwriting looks like my mom’s, etc etc. I don’t have any of the other books to compare it to, but I bet you’re right.

    Also, your unbreakable vow theory sounds very enticing. That’s sort of the thing I meant with a pre-arrangement, like, there was a pact made about it. An unbreakable vow would totally fit the criteria of why Dumbledore would trust Snape, and why Snape had to kill him to protect Draco. Iiiiiinteresting…

    In General:
    One of the theories in the comments somewhere was that Snape was (again) acting without knowing the full story, just like he did when he ratted out Lily and James Potter to Voldemort. Like, he made both of the unbreakable vows without knowing exactly what was going on or what would eventually be needed of him. You’ll recall that he didn’t hear the entire prophecy and acted on it by telling Voldemort anyway. That sort of thing.

    At the end, Snape kept merely deflecting Harry’s spells/curses/whatever against him – he didn’t retaliate. This sticks with the “protect Harry and Draco” thing.

    AND he kept getting REEEEALLY angry when he was called a coward, which would also fit with the Unbreakable Vow theory, since he just had to kill a very important wizard who happened to be the one person who truly trusted him. That takes a bit of bravery/strength, not cowardice. Hence the anger.

  • Callie says:

    Yeah, especially if he *was* trying to protect Harry… and Harry was the one calling him a coward. But also, Snape did mention that he and the Death Eaters weren’t supposed to touch Harry, because Voldemort himself wanted to kill him. Hmm… who knows… Snape could have at least hurt Harry a *little* bit, instead of deflecting all Harry’s curses…. Dunno… dunno….

  • Meggan says:

    Hm.

    One of the things I think is strange about book six is that it’s a direct springboard to number seven. Nothing really gets resolved, there’s no closure. Dumbledore dies, the Horcrux is revealed to be a fake, Harry leaves Hogwarts… There’s so many loose ends! None of the rest of the books have been left this open! Book seven had better be longer than Book five as far as I’m concerned.

    As a side note, I’ve read that the last word of the last chapter of the last book is scar.