Honestly, I find this chapter to be fairly boring. Sure it's fun to hear about the wonders of Hogwarts, the classes and teachers, but it's not done in the most interesting of ways, and we have plenty of time to learn these things as the series moves along. Even the Snape stuff in this chapter is a bit tedious, since at this point Snape's character (and all the teachers) seem a bit one-dimensional. Sure there might be a slight bit of curiosity as to why a teacher would dislike Harry so immediately, but mostly at this point, Snape just seems like a dick.
The visit to Hagrid's is a bit more interesting, if only for the fact that we get a little clue that this is going to be a mystery, Harry's got some ideas about what's going on with the bank heist (and really what 11-year-old wouldn't?) and he's going to take it upon himself to see if he can sort it all out. Perfectly reasonable. (Yeah, I'm feeling a bit sarcastic today.)
One last thing, and if you have the answer, please tell me because I might just be having a brain fart. The last sentence in this chapter: "And did Hagrid know something about Snape that he didn't want to tell Harry?" Did he? I was under the impression that Dumbledore was the only one who knew about Snape's motivations and back story. I mean, okay, Hagrid may have known that James and Snape didn't get along, but is that really something to act all weird and avoidy about? If that's it, wouldn't it make more sense just to say; "Yeh, well, he and yer dad didn't really get along and the guy carries a grudge." I mean wouldn't that be better than to allow an ELEVEN YEAR OLD to think that a TEACHER hates him for NO REASON? Not that the James thing is a very good reason either, but Snape's emotional intelligence level isn't exactly stratospheric and at least it would give Harry something to hang onto through the next 7 years. Perhaps, if Harry had been told this from the beginning, he could have just reminded himself of it every time Snape was unfair, "He's really punishing my dad." and perhaps at least Harry could have been spared some of the enmity of the relationship.
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Maybe the thing that Hagrid knew about Snape was that he was at some point a Death Eater and he hated Harry because he was the downfall of Lord Voldemort, maybe Hagrid didn't say anything out of respect for Dumbledore and not wanting to express that he suspected Snape because Dumbledore would have told him that he trusted Snape and that would be the end of that discussion.
ReplyDelete... I'm really just commenting to tell you that I love that you used the word "avoidy." :-P
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