Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Books/Prisoner of Azkaban/Chapter 13
From Wikibooks, the open-content textbooks collection
Chapter 13 of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban: Gryffindor Versus Ravenclaw
Contents |
[edit] Synopsis
Scabbers' apparent demise at the claws of Crookshanks appears to have ended Ron and Hermione's friendship. Ron feels that Hermione is unsympathetic; she apparently believes that attacking rats is normal cat behavior and that there is no real evidence that Crookshanks attacked Scabbers. Harry, however, thinks there is, given the physical evidence and Crookshanks' history of attacking Scabbers. Hermione, feeling Harry always sides with Ron, storms off. Ron is taking the loss hard, and not even the twins' reminding him that he thought Scabbers was useless (mere days before) seems to have any effect. Finally, Harry invites him to Quidditch practice, offering him a chance to ride his Firebolt, which cheers him up a bit.
Arriving at the Quidditch pitch, Harry meets the team and Madam Hooch, who has been delegated to guard Harry during practice. She is entranced by the Firebolt, as the Gryffindor common room had been, and soliloquizes about it until Oliver reminds her they have to practice. And it is a magnificent practice. Inspired by the Firebolt, everyone works so well that Oliver does not have a single criticism—a first for him. Oliver asks Harry about his Dementor problem, and Harry replies, a bit untruthfully, that he has mastered the spell. As practice breaks up, Ron flies the Firebolt into the darkening sky. Madam Hooch awakens, reprimands Harry and Ron for letting her fall asleep, and sends them to the castle. On the way back, Harry thinks he sees a pair of eyes watching him. Ron uses the Lumos charm to reveal Crookshanks. Harry does not want to admit that he thought it might be a Grim.
The Quidditch match is the next morning. The Gryffindors form an honor guard and carry the Firebolt down to breakfast. Students from the other Houses, including Ravenclaw, come over to check it out, including Draco Malfoy who, as expected, makes a wisecrack. The team head for the Quidditch pitch where Ravenclaw are already waiting. Oliver mentions Ravenclaw's new Seeker, Cho Chang, saying she is good, but is riding a slower broom, a Comet Two-Sixty. Harry notices she is pretty. Madam Hooch blows her whistle, and the match is on. Lee Jordan is commentating, but repeatedly lapses into descriptions of the Firebolt instead of the game, for which he gets a stern warning. Harry spots and loses the Snitch several times, finally seeing it by the Gryffindor goalposts, when he accelerates for it. So does Cho, but she gasps and points downwards. Harry, seeing three Dementors on the field, pulls his wand and summons a Patronus, sending it at the Dementors. Then he blasts ahead of Cho to grab the Snitch, winning the game.
In the ensuing celebrations on the field, Professor Lupin comments that Harry produced quite the Patronus. Harry says the Dementors had not affected him, but Lupin says they were not Dementors. It was actually Draco Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, and Marcus Flint disguised in Dementor-like robes (with Draco and Goyle having shared a robe, to appear larger). Professor McGonagall berates them soundly and deducts House points.
There is a celebration in the Gryffindor Common room. Fred and George hand out treats from Honeyduke's and The Three Broomsticks. Hermione does not join the party, saying she has 422 pages of Muggle Studies to read before Monday. Ron comments loudly that Scabbers would have liked to be there, and Hermione departs crying. Harry asks Ron to cut her some slack, but Ron says not until she starts acting a little sorry about Scabbers. The party goes on until one in the morning, when Professor McGonagall appears and sends everyone to bed.
Harry is awakened by Ron screaming. Sirius Black has slashed Ron's bed curtains and was standing over him with a knife. Harry sprints down to the Common room. The noise has brought most Gryffindors from their dormitories, and Percy orders everyone back to bed. Ron tells him Black was there. Professor McGonagall arrives and asks Sir Cadogan how Black got in. Sir Cadogan states proudly that he allowed a man in because he had the passwords — a whole list of them. Livid, McGonagall demands to know who was stupid enough to write down all the passwords and then lose the list. A shamed-faced Neville raises his hand.
[edit] Analysis
Madam Hooch's rhapsodizing about the Firebolt actually feels quite out of place. Readers may not understand why it feels wrong, but will be somewhat disturbed by it all the same. If we look back through this book, we will find that two chapters earlier, when Professor McGonagall had confiscated the broom, she had said that she was going to have Madam Hooch and Professor Flitwick examine it for hidden jinxes. Thus, Madam Hooch has been working with the broom for almost four months, from late December to mid-April, which is certainly enough time for the (non-magical) charm to wear off.
Harry produces a Patronus, but concentrating on the Snitch, he is unable to see what form it takes. Lupin, however, appears shaken by what he sees, although he later congratulates Harry on it. If Harry managed to produce a corporeal Patronus, then nearly everyone in the Quidditch pitch now knows he can produce one and what form it takes. However, only Lupin seems to understand the shape's significance.
Unable to remember the numerous passwords, Neville made a list and then apparently lost it, allowing Black to find the list and use it to enter the castle. The repercussions for Neville are severe: he is humiliated in front of his classmates and punished by McGonagall. We will learn later just how this list fell into Sirius' hands.
Ron was terrified by his experience with Sirius Black, but Black’s behavior in Gryffindor Tower seems at odds with his mass murderer record. Though he slashes Ron’s curtains with a knife, he does not harm either Ron or Harry. They wonder why, when Ron yelled, Sirius ran away. Presuming, as everyone does, that Sirius was targeting Harry, it would have been simple enough for such a vicious killer to permanently silence Ron and quickly move on to the next bed to find his real target.
Meanwhile, there is a widening rift between Ron and Hermione. Hermione's refusal to express any sympathy or take responsibility for Scabbers' apparent demise could indicate that something is preventing her from behaving appropriately. Being that she has just patched things up with Ron and Harry after a long and difficult estrangement, she may be unwilling to admit that there is another problem that could threaten their friendship. She is also increasingly tired and shrill and clearly under much stress from her studies. Considering she has always easily been at the top of her class, this is difficult to understand.
Harry has his first encounter with Ravenclaw's Seeker, Cho Chang, the first girl he is strongly attracted to. Harry "felt a slight jolt in the region of his stomach that he didn't think had anything to do with nerves." Cho is pretty and also a very good flier, who, at least once, thwarts Harry for the Snitch despite having a slower broom. This may make her even more attractive to Harry.
This is also the first and only time that Harry plays a game against Ravenclaw. In all of the other books something in Harry's adventures causes him to miss playing against them.
[edit] Questions
[edit] Review
- How was Sirius Black able to get into the Gryffindor Common room?
[edit] Further Study
- Is Hermione acting insensitively towards Ron after Scabbers disappears? Is she taking responsibility for what Crookshanks might have done?
- Was Crookshanks actually responsible for Scabbers' disappearance? Explain.
- Although Sirius Black enters Harry's dorm, he does nothing to harm him and instead slashes Ron's bed curtains? Why?
- Remus Lupin congratulates Harry on the strong Patronus he conjures during the Quidditch game, but its form surprises Lupin (although its shape remains unknown to readers). What form might it have taken and why was Lupin so affected by it?
[edit] Greater Picture
Harry's Patronus will later be revealed to be a stag. At this point, only three people know the significance of this; Black, Lupin, and Pettigrew, James' friends, would recognize the stag as James' Animagus form. Of the three, Lupin is the only one here present.
The fact that Harry can produce a corporeal Patronus in his third year at Hogwarts is a sign that, if properly motivated, he can do magic at quite an advanced level. The Patronus charm is normally taught to sixth or seventh year students. It is because of this that, in Harry's fifth year, many students seem awed by Harry's ability to perform this charm. One might wonder why they are surprised, having quite possibly seen the Patronus on the Quidditch pitch in this chapter. It is, of course, possible that the students who are most surprised by Harry's ability either were looking at something else at the time and didn't notice the white and misty stag, or if they did see it, did not understand what it was.
Later explanation will reveal that Sirius was actually after Scabbers, who is now missing and presumed killed by Crookshanks. Sirius may have learned from Crookshanks that Scabbers is Ron's pet, and which bed Ron sleeps in. This would explain why Sirius targeted Ron. It is likely that, with Scabbers' apparent demise being so recent, Sirius was unaware of it.
This also is an explanation for Scabbers' disappearance. While Ron seems to believe that Scabbers' haggard appearance is due to the actions of Crookshanks, we should recall that he was already looking poorly when Ron and Hermione met up with Harry in Diagon Alley. Ron was buying rat tonic at the time as he felt that Scabbers needed it; and it was in that same visit that Crookshanks first attacked Scabbers, and Hermione bought him. Scabbers' bedraggled appearance actually dates back to the Weasley household's discovery of Black's escape; Scabbers will have heard it being discussed and will know that Black is on his way to Hogwarts. As Black got ever closer to the Gryffindor common room, Scabbers will have decided that it was time to disappear, and will have faked his own death, as we will find out he had done before, before he departed to another location where he could still stay in touch with the Wizarding world.
It will be found later that Black, in his Animagus form, had managed to win Crookshanks' confidence. Crookshanks had stolen the list of passwords from Neville and had passed them to Black. It is uncertain why Crookshanks was unable to inform Black of Scabbers' departure.
The rift between Ron and Hermione will be mended only by an outside event: Hagrid writing to say that Buckbeak had lost his final appeal. The Trio will re-unite to visit Hagrid, against his instructions, to try and comfort him.
