GoF 20

[pauraque_bk]

This is just about the halfway mark, in terms of page count. Which is far, far further than I've ever gotten in previous attempts at re-reading this book.


GoF 20: The First Task

Harry got up on Sunday morning and dressed so inattentively that it was a while before he realised he was trying to pull his hat onto his foot instead of his sock. (295)

Again with the hats. JKR remembers them only when they're convenient.

'Dragons are extremely difficult to slay, owing to the ancient magic that imbues their thick hides, which none but the most powerful spells can penetrate ... but Sirius said a simple one would do it...'

'Let's try some simple spellbooks, then,' said Harry, throwing aside Men Who Love Dragons Too Much. (295-296)

Hee.

Hides imbued with ancient plot devices, you say? Incredible.

In Chapter 19 amythis reminded me that any discussion of dragons in the Potterverse should mention the fact that Draco is a dragon.

So Harry goes to find Cedric and tells him about the dragons, explaining that everyone else knows already.

[Cedric] stared at Harry, and there was a puzzled, almost suspicious look in his eyes.

'Why are you telling me?' he asked.

Harry looked at him in disbelief. He was sure Cedric wouldn't have asked that if he had seen the dragons himself. Harry wouldn't have let his worst enemy face those monsters unprepared -- well, perhaps Malfoy or Snape...

[...]

'It's just ... fair, isn't it?' he said to Cedric. 'We all know now ... we're on an even footing, aren't we?'

Cedric was still looking at him in a slightly suspicious way[...] (298-299)

Cedric doubts that Harry's telling the truth about the dragons? He really thinks Harry would mislead him? Doesn't think very much of the kid at this point, I guess. Or maybe he doesn't like Harry's idea that two wrongs make a right.

And isn't it amazing that when Harry thinks of his worst enemies, Voldemort doesn't come to mind?

Junior overhears them and pulls Harry into his office.

'That was a very decent thing you just did, Potter,' Moody said quietly. (299)

I love this line. I'm not sure I can analyze it, but it feels like there's depth to it. Is Junior play-acting, or is he really impressed by Harry? Does he grow to respect the boy he's attempting to kill?

[Moody:] 'Secrecy Sensor. Vibrates when it detects concealment and lies ... no use here, of course, too much interference -- students in every direction lying about why they haven't done their homework. Been humming ever since I got here. I had to disable my Sneakoscope because it wouldn't stop whistling[...]' (300)

I bet he did. In PoA, Harry has to stuff some socks into his Sneakoscope because it keeps going off, detecting Peter/Scabbers in Ron's pocket.

'Oh, that's my Foe-Glass. See them out there, skulking around? I'm not really in trouble until I see the whites of their eyes. That's when I open my trunk.'

He let out a short, harsh laugh, and pointed to the large trunk under the window. (300)

Pardon? Real!Moody is in the trunk, among other things. I...don't really understand what he's saying here. Neither does Harry.

'It's all right,' said Moody, sitting down and stretching out his wooden leg with a groan. 'Cheating's a traditional part of the Triwizard Tournament and always has been.' (300)

Is it, now? How interesting. Goes along with previous comments that the Goblet itself is a puzzle to be beaten -- if they really wanted to keep younger kids out they'd have a human being do it, etc.

'I've been telling Dumbledore from the start, he can be as high-minded as he likes, but you can bet old Karkaroff and Maxime won't be. They'll have told their champions everything they can. They want to win. They want to beat Dumbledore. They'd like to prove he's only human.' (301)

Oh, I like this! *claps* Dumbledore isn't quite human, of course, narratively. He acts as a deus ex machina a lot of the time, and it's hard to analyze him on a psychological/human level.

'I don't show favouritism, me. I'm just going to give you some good, general advice.' (301)

Now that he knows everyone is on equal footing about the dragons, he has to give Harry a leg up. He asks him a couple of leading questions and doesn't let up until Harry figures out that he should use his broom.

This reminds me very much of the obstacles at the end of PS/SS. Remember the bit where he has to fly around on a broomstick (provided) and catch a golden key? In the first task he flies around on a broomstick, compares dodging the dragon's fire to dodging a bludger, and catches a glittering golden egg. I'm not saying that Dumbledore intentionally set a task that would be possible for Harry, as I believe he did in PS/SS, but it is awfully convenient.

'Got a plan?' said Bagman, lowering his voice conspiratorially. 'Because I don't mind sharing a few pointers, if you'd like them, you know. I mean,' Bagman continued, lowering his voice still further, 'you're the underdog here, Harry ... anything I can do to help...' (307)

No kidding. By this point he's had ample opportunity to bet on Harry to win, and I'm no longer confused by his enthusiasm about Harry's participation. As a couple of people pointed out, his initial squeefulness might have been because he immediately thought this would be a great opportunity to make a longshot bet. This makes sense if Bagman is a gambling addict, which I'm beginning to think he is, given that he seems to have run out of money to pay back the Weasley twins.

In any case, Harry is totally unwilling to listen to any advice Bagman might have.

He felt much more aware of his body than usual; very aware of the way his heart was pumping fast, and his fingers tingling with fear ... yet at the same time, he seemed to be outside himself, seeing the walls of the tent, and hearing the crowd, as though from far away... (308)

I like the way JKR has written Harry's anxiety in general, not just here. Yes, that's right, I actually liked something about her writing. In Goblet of Fire. It occasionally happens!

Ludo Bagman -- ten.

'Ten?' said Harry in disbelief. 'But ... I got hurt ... what's he playing at?'

'Harry, don't complain!' Ron yelled excitedly.

And now Karkaroff raised his wand. He paused for a moment, and then a number shot out of his wand, too -- four.

'What?' Ron bellowed furiously. 'Four? You lousy biased scumbag, you gave Krum ten!' (315)

Oh Ludo, you bastard. He's not just biased just because he likes Harry's pretty face, of course, he's influencing the outcome because he has money riding on it. Igor's deflated score is more a counterbalance than an unfairness, if you ask me. This is also a great opportunity to observe the "wrong is only wrong if someone we don't like does it" mentality in the wild. Ron's amorality here is so blatant it's almost shocking (though admittedly he's all psyched up because he and Harry are friends again, so maybe I shouldn't be too hard on him).


Previous GoF posts are saved in memories here.

Comments

[maidenjedi]

Yeah, don't be too hard on Ron. He's overcompensating because he knows he was wrong. Now, you've pointed out the "wrong is only wrong if it's someone else" bit, and that's something I've picked up on as well. It's almost from the very beginning of the series. In GoF, the cheating is the obvious angle. I wonder what Harry would do if Dumbledore found out he was getting tips from Moody or Sirius? Moreover, what would Dumbledore say/do? Personally I think he'd be disappointed in Harry, and that's something we know would crush Harry's spirit. But Harry never thinks about that.

I think this book is about invincibility, and the shattering of that illusion, and this chapter most specifically points it out. The tasks are dangerous, and this is arguably the worst of the lot. Getting to be a Champion is going to give these kids a bit of a big head (except in Harry's case; oddly, he doesn't really seem to have inherited James' ego, or at least it doesn't manifest itself in the same ways). The First Task oughta knock 'em down a peg.

Cedric is interesting here. A Hufflepuff wouldn't naturally distrust someone's intentions, I don't think. So your second thought, that maybe he's just not okay with Harry's "two wrongs make a right" justification, is very tempting.

[skelkins.livejournal.com]

Cedric is interesting here. A Hufflepuff wouldn't naturally distrust someone's intentions, I don't think.

I don't really know. The Hufflepuffs were very suspicious of Harry's intentions in CoS, weren't they? Just because they're an honest lot themselves doesn't necessarily mean that they'd be particularly trusting of others. In fact, I can easily imagine them being somewhat less trusting of outsiders, for the very reason that they must know that many people consider them to be "a lot o' duffers."

There's really nothing like feeling that everyone else thinks of you as an easy mark to make you really paranoid about the possibility that other people might be trying to pull the wool over your eyes.

I'd always read Cedric's hesitance here as genuine suspicion. If it really is a kind of "common wisdom" that cheating has always been a part of the Twiwizard Tournament, then it's quite possible that Cedric's also been exposed to that sentiment. And at this stage in the game, he has no particular reason to trust that Harry's sense of fair play is nearly as well-developed as his own.

[black-dog.livejournal.com]

I can easily imagine them being somewhat less trusting of outsiders

Zach, in OOTP, is of course a perfect example of this as well. For a House that's all about loyalty, their undercurrent of suspicousness -- how do you earn their loyalty and trust? -- is part of their charm, I think. Who can resist Ernie's pompous but endearing "you're all right" speech to Harry in OOTP? Sister M said once that the Hufflepuffs always bite the gold coin before accepting it.

[skelkins.livejournal.com]

This is just about the halfway mark, in terms of page count. Which is far, far further than I've ever gotten in previous attempts at re-reading this book.

Hee! We all have our less-than-favorites, I suppose. It's Order of the Phoenix that I've never managed to succeed in re-reading. I'm counting on you to help me through it once you're done with GoF, actually. But, er, hey. No pressure. :-)

I love this line. I'm not sure I can analyze it, but it feels like there's depth to it. Is Junior play-acting, or is he really impressed by Harry?

"Decent people are so easy to manipulate, Potter."

Junior seems to me to have a really ambivalent attitude towards fair play. On the one hand, he sometimes seems quite genuinely impressed with it as a character trait - and quite genuinely angered by demonstrations of its reverse (The Bouncing Ferret Incident, his concern over the entire idea of "appropriate punishment" for the disloyal Death Eaters, the claim that he found his hypocritical father "disappointing," etc.)

On the other hand, he also often seems to be really revelling in his ability to exploit other people's senses of decency and fair play for his own cruel and devious purposes. And there's something about his fondness for misleading people with the truth that also speaks to me of a really deep and twisted ambivalence towards the entire notion of fairness.

Does he grow to respect the boy he's attempting to kill?

I find it interesting how this expression of seeming respect for Harry's "decency" (which interferes with his original plans for the First Task) seems to mirror his later expression of seeming admiration for Harry's self-sufficiency (which is what will interfere with his original plans for the Second Task).

Decency and self-sufficiency are two of the traits in which Junior himself seems somewhat strikingly lacking - and which I tend to feel he really does value. Perhaps that accounts for some of the ambivalence here? He both resents and desires those traits which he himself wants to possess, but does not?

I...don't really understand what he's saying here. Neither does Harry.

Neither do I. I suppose it's possible that he's got some nasty devices hidden away somewhere in that trunk. When it's finally opened, we see various Dark detectors and such...but it's all kind of glossed over as we hurry on to the bottom level, where poor Moody is being kept.

Since Junior does like to entertain himself by telling the truth in rather gruesome contexts, it's also possible that he's referring to what he's resolved to do should his plan go hopelessly pear-shaped. The first step in an "abort" scenario would probably be to kill Moody. (Then, I'm not sure if Junior's ego would really allow him even to contemplate an "abort" scenario.)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_hannelore/]

And isn't it amazing that when Harry thinks of his worst enemies, Voldemort doesn't come to mind?

psst, HTML tininess in the dungeon, sir. ;) Thought you might want to know.

*thunk*

[pauraque]

My mood (drunk) on this post was not inaccurate. I wrote the entire thing while under the influence of several margaritas plus one sangria. I'm amazed that's the only html mistake I made!

[black-dog.livejournal.com]

I think alcohol is a secret ingredient in some of the best meta. :)

[amythis.livejournal.com]

Harry got up on Sunday morning and dressed so inattentively that it was a while before he realised he was trying to pull his hat onto his foot instead of his sock. (295)
Again with the hats. JKR remembers them only when they're convenient.

But she mentions socks every chance she gets.

'Let's try some simple spellbooks, then,' said Harry, throwing aside Men Who Love Dragons Too Much. (295-296)

"Hagrid, I think you should read this."

And isn't it amazing that when Harry thinks of his worst enemies, Voldemort doesn't come to mind?

Maybe he puts Voldemort on a different level.

I'm not saying that Dumbledore intentionally set a task that would be possible for Harry, as I believe he did in PS/SS, but it is awfully convenient.

Which may indicate that Dumbledore is cheating on a higher plane.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Harry looked at him in disbelief. He was sure Cedric wouldn't have asked that if he had seen the dragons himself. Harry wouldn't have let his worst enemy face those monsters unprepared -- well, perhaps Malfoy or Snape...

I love this. I mean, obviously Voldemort is really his worst enemy (people tend to get very offended if you even try to refer to Draco as an enemy, much less a worst enemy, at times!) but here Harry is referring to people he can't stand rather than this mythical guy trying to kill him. He doesn't really want to see Voldemort suffer-those impulses are usually reserved for Snape and Draco-he just wants him gone.

But I love that Rowling reminds us of this feeling of Harry's. As much as I hated the whole "Harry doesn't care about Draco at all anymore" after OotP it also obviously wasn't true. He might not have time to expend on it all the time (and frankly it seems like Draco feels much the same when he's got Voldemort to worry about), but there's always Malfoy and Snape to be the person Harry *would* allow to suffer in whatever way he doesn't want to see anyone else suffer. There's this here, and then in OotP Harry thinks Malfoy is the one person one would be justified in hanging upside-down like Snape was in the Pensieve. Finally in HBP this running idea seems to get explored. Yay!

Cedric doubts that Harry's telling the truth about the dragons? He really thinks Harry would mislead him? Doesn't think very much of the kid at this point, I guess. Or maybe he doesn't like Harry's idea that two wrongs make a right.

I agree with skelkins that Hufflepuffs are rather paranoid and suspicious of outsiders. Actually, I usually think of them as one step away from an angry mob at all times (with a handy closet full of torches and pitchforks in the common room). They're kind of the best and worst of every day Britishers it seems to me sometimes, rather like hobbits with the things that drive you crazy about them and the things that make them great.

I love this line. I'm not sure I can analyze it, but it feels like there's depth to it. Is Junior play-acting, or is he really impressed by Harry? Does he grow to respect the boy he's attempting to kill?

::snort:: Well, everyone must be impressed by Harry, just as random DEs mid-fight have to compliment Ginny's looks.:-P In Barty's case, though, I think he probably does have some real reason for his reaction here. He seems to feel very badly used by everyone and disappointed in things he believed in (Percy could easily be hurt this way as well, actually). Harry is helping Cedric because he's the only one with a disadvantage, and Barty probably feels incredibly abandoned by his own comrades. He does seem like somebody who maybe wants to be heroic but feels the world is too fallen for it or something like that.

Oh, I like this! *claps* Dumbledore isn't quite human, of course, narratively. He acts as a deus ex machina a lot of the time, and it's hard to analyze him on a psychological/human level.

What's annoying, though, as slinkhard linked to previously is that it's not the other teachers who are telling the students it's *Hagrid* as well. It seems a little slimy to set Dumbledore up as this incredibly moral person representing his school and then oops, he can't help it if he's got Hagrid doing the same dirty work for the Hogwarts Champion.

Though that's an interesting introduction of people wanting to prove DD human, as we now know he certainly is.

Ron's amorality here is so blatant it's almost shocking (though admittedly he's all psyched up because he and Harry are friends again, so maybe I shouldn't be too hard on him).

Yeah, you can only ever be too hard on Ron because he's so blatant in his motivation.

I recently read a theory, btw, that Ludo Bagman is our blond DE from HBP...

[laverinth.livejournal.com]

I recently read a theory, btw, that Ludo Bagman is our blond DE from HBP...

Oh? I don't think so... Rowling usually describes characters in such a way that they are recognisable when described again if not in the exact same way. Theodore Nott, for example, was described as 'weedy' in one scene, and differently in another scene - but similar enough to assume they could be the same person. The blonde death eater was not described at all similar to Ludo Bagman, from what I remember.

What were the reasonings for this theory?

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Basically that the blond DE was muscular and blond, and that we don't know what happened to Bagman after he disappeared (he was associated with the DEs in the past, though not one himself that we know of).

[arwencordelia.livejournal.com]

Cedric may still believe that Harry really did put his own name in the Goblet, that he wanted to compete in the tournament. And if I remember correctly, Cedric didn't seem to be mad at Harry for doing that; he just kind of smirked and said something like "okay, sure you didn't do it" (more or less... this was several chapters back :-)

Cedric seems to like Harry, but he may see him as just a very competitive person. Maybe not the kind of person who would go out of his way to cheat actively... but perhaps someone who would not share any helpful information they happened to learn by chance (or, er, Hagrid).

Come to think of it, maybe Cedric recognises Harry's Slytherin tendencies before they fully manifest... In HBP, I think Harry would have mulled over this information for a while, and think about whether and how to use it. Here (in GOF), the thought of not evening the playing field doesn't even occur to him.

[skelkins.livejournal.com]

There could be a bit of guilt-by-association going on, as well. When Cedric ran into Harry over the summer, Harry was with Fred and George, who did try to get past the age line. (And who also spent that entire encounter cracking their knuckles and glowering menacingly at Cedric.) Given all of that, I can easily imagine Cedric thinking that Harry is probably also the sort of person who would try to cheat to get his name into the Goblet.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Also, Cedric's father made such a big deal out of Harry's losing to Cedric at Quidditch (a win Cedric doesn't feel he earned honestly) he may feel Harry has special reason to want to trip him up.

[pilly2009.livejournal.com]

And isn't it amazing that when Harry thinks of his worst enemies, Voldemort doesn't come to mind?

Figures. He's met Voldemort (as in, the Dark Lord Voldemort, not Tommy Riddle) for about ten minutes in total at this point. The guy didn't even manage to make his "worst fears" list.

[jane85.livejournal.com]

Pardon? Real!Moody is in the trunk, among other things. I...don't really understand what he's saying here. Neither does Harry.

When I read that passage, I got the feeling that Crouch!Moody was making fun of Real!Moody, mostly because most people consider him to be this lunatic who's always talking about that 'constant vigilance' crap. I think Crouch!Moody finds it funny because this 'constant vigilance' didn't work for Real!Moody, and he was able to overcome him.