The Seer Overheard, by revgeorge

Both the point about Trelawny’s version of events and about Dumbledore asking Harry to get the cloak confused me, though I suppose with the latter, Dumbledore might have just been giving Harry an excuse to go say goodbye or to have some more time to think out his anger about Snape.

I did want to mention, though, about Trelawney and her gift – in an earlier chapter, Trelawney passes Harry, who’s hidden, and pulls out a tarot card about a dark young man, possibly trouble, who dislikes the questioner. She decides that can’t be right, and moves on, reshuffling. While most of what Trelawney does outside her trance is ridiculously fake, her card reading in this chapter actually seems to make sense, both here and with the lightning-struck tower. Is it possible that underneath all the ethereal personality, Trelawney does have a power she doesn’t fully understand, something beyond her two real predictions?

Trelawney has Cassandra’s curse that her prophecies are “all heard and none believed”. She is almost always right, but rarely believed.

This is one of the oldest plot contrivances on record, dating back at least to Homer and probably further. But still a powerful literary mechanism.

I am not sure why. Maybe it is because it undercuts the “ending cliché”, the feeling of dissatisfaction we get when we know how a book is going to end.

I don’t think she can technically be called a Cassandra figure because she doesn’t realize when she’s predicting true things. For instance, she interprets Harry’s birthday by the stars as being midwinter. She tries too hard. Just like with the tarot cards, she says they can’t be right. In some senses, she’s Cassandra-like, in that no one will believe the tower is coming, but in others, I think it’s more fear that she’s not a true Seer that keeps her in that false-interpretation mode.

By that interpretation, though, Harry isn’t *killed* by dementors at the end of book 3 – he’s just rendered soulless. He’d still be alive, just empty.

Good post and questions, revgeorge.

D seems to be trying to decide whether to tell Harry Snape is the one who warned him that V was after Lily et al, but decides not to break his long ago promise to Snape. My theory about D asking Harry to get the cloak is that he uses that time to go warn Snape about Harry hearing Draco celebrating and that Harry knows Snape was the one who overheard the prophecy, and perhaps to ask Snape for permission to tell Harry the truth about Snape and Lily.

The part about Trelawney predicting Harry’s birth as being in midwinter I always thought was an unwitting sensing of the fragment of V’s soul attached to Harry (V was born in midwinter).

I have always been struck by how Trelawney describes Snape as “that pushing, thrusting young man,” some of the most sexual verbal imagery in the entire series. She really wants him, no? Did she drive herself to drink through pining after him?

It is really weird that Trelawney remembers Snape being there. I thought perhaps she went back into her trance and finished the prophecy after he was thrown out, but in D’s memory she seems to say the whole prophecy without interruption (and note how when D showed him that prophecy in OOTP he didn’t take Harry into the pensieve, he had Trelawney’s image rise out of it so that Harry couldn’t see who else was there).

I’m wondering how Draco found out how to get into the ROHT. When Marietta blabbed in OOTP, did she say walk back and forth three times thinking about what you need in your head? So is Draco the one who hid the cabinet in there after asking for a place to hide it (first time I thought of that; before I assumed it had been hidden by the house-elves)? Draco probably didn’t think of asking the room to lock itself so no one else could get into it while he’s there.

Lily Luna, good comments. I never would’ve thought much of Trelawney’s reaction to Snape, certainly not in a sexual sense!

In regard to the Cabinet, this was the one that Peeves broke in Book 2 & that Fred & George used on Montague in Book 5. The cabinet originally seemed to be in a place above Filch’s office, which was lower down in the castle. I would assume the broken cabinet remained there until the Twins used it. Whether it stayed at the same location after Montague was rescued & was then later moved by Draco to the ROHT or whether it got moved there after Montague’s rescue is hard to tell. In regard to Draco using the room, you’re probably right that he never thought to be that specific. The Room seems to desire specificity, something that Neville seems to understand later on & use to his advantage in DH.

I think D was just laying the groundwork for when Snape kills him, so Harry can think D was a foolish old man to trust Snape. He tries to do it while at the same time giving Harry a hint, so that maybe on future reflection Harry (or Hermione) will figure out the truth. After all at some point Snape has to get Harry to trust him enough to believe him when he tells Harry he has to sacrifice himself to V in order to destroy the soul fragment attached to him.

While your formulation of what D should have said to Harry would have been kinder to all, it might have raised too much doubt among the Order if Harry had repeated it. This brings to my mind the unaswered question from DH, which is: Who is the “source we discussed” that V refers to from whom he thinks Snape is getting his info at the beginning of DH? My best theory is that it’s Phineas Nigellus — that V thinks Phineas would be loyal to Snape and V as a fellow Slytherin and would repeat to Snape conversations he heard in the Headmaster’s office (in use by McGonagall).

Well Phineas WAS a fan of Snape, but he’s not a traitor. What I’m thinking is Snape tells V that Phineas is loyal to Snape and to V and that Phineas never liked D and that Phineas is passing him info he overhears when McG is using the office and/or info he overhears at Grimmauld Place (actually, more likely Grimmauld Place). Otherwise, Snape would have to convince V that a member of the Order was traitorous to the order and loyal to Snape. Could be Mundungus (who is whom I originally thought of).

I’ve often wondered whether Hermione doesn’t have her suspicions about Snape’s motivations, esp. after the Silver Doe scene, but keeps quiet about them. In fact, Harry has told her and Ron everything that happened in D’s office when he goes back to give them the Felix Felicis, so she may even figure out that if Snape’s biggest regret was for his actions leading to the killing of the Potters and Snape hated James, then he must have cared deeply about Lily. After all, Hermione is better at feelings and stuff than Ron and Harry (she also doesn’t have Snape’s Worst Memory or a longstanding hatred of Snape to deceive her).

I thought Snape said he had a source because he didn’t want V to know he was in the order himself. Since he was in the order there was more information he could be giving and was withholding. By saying he had a source that limits the information.

In fact, Snape’s source probably is Phineas with Dumbledore’s consent. Unless there’s someone in the Order who secretly knows that Snape is still on their side and is the real source, since as a practical matter they cleared out of Grimmauld Place after D was killed so Phineas wouldn’t have anything to overhear, now that I think about it.

Anyway, sorry to hijack this thread into a discussion of DH instead of the chapter at hand.

With regard to your original question about whether Rowling is effective in showing the horror of the war outside the Hogwarts cocoon, I don’t know. She does convey some of the terrible things – dementor attacks, Greyback killing the little boy, etc. together with the comedy of Dung pretending to be an inferius (sounds like something out of Scooby Doo). But it seems like a distant storm, kind of like how Harry describes V punishing the Malfoys while he’s digging Dobby’s grave.

Okay, time to finish cleaning up before the family comes over for July 4th dinner.

I’m not sure Phineas can be the source Snape tells V about. First off, looking through The Prince’s Tale, I’m already wondering how Snape managed to get back into Dumbledore’s office prior to being made Headmaster, to talk to DD about giving V the correct date. The ministry hadn’t even fallen at that point. I suppose he might have been able to had Hogwarts been completely empty, of teachers and everyone, for the summer. Second, why would the Order have discussed their plans in the Headmaster’s office? Especially if the school was closed for the summer. Third, if the Order wasn’t discussing plans there, I wonder where DD’s other portrait might hang, so that he could learn about their plans. The whole situation confuses me, actually. It’s a little farfetched for Snape to tell V that he can’t lead the Death Eaters into Grimmauld Place and yet can go there himself in order to talk with Phineas, who is hearing information about the Order from the Headmaster’s office. Even more farfetched for Snape to say he can sneak into Hogwarts to talk to Phineas and none of the other portraits would report him. Then again, Snape being able to get back into the school when everyone’s on the lookout for him seems a little farfetched, too, so I don’t know what to think.

Does DD have a portrait somewhere else? If not, how is he so well-informed about the Order’s plans after his death?

I suppose this is all completely off-topic for this chapter, but I just saw a lot of discussion above…

I’ve assumed that the “source” was Dumbledore’s portrait — of course, this requires Voldemort to believe the portrait didn’t know how Dumbledore had died! Perhaps it had already been painted some time ago, and wouldn’t know of anything which had happened to Dumbledore after it was painted? But it would still have had to have been recently painted in order to have useful intel on the Order’s plans for moving Harry.

Amanda, Rowling did say in an interview that Hogwarts was deserted over the summer (except by Filch). Of course this is an extra-textual statement, but if we accept it, it helps explain Snape’s ability to sneak into Hogwarts undetected. The problem remains, though, of how Snape could get past the castle’s magical defenses; not to mention whether Hogwarts would still be left unguarded even in wartime.

On further reflection, I guess Phineas can’t be the source if the Order has abandoned Grimmauld Place.

Snape Confunds Mundungus at D’s suggestion to implant the idea of the seven Potters in his head, he doesn’t use the Imperius Curse on him.

There are really two “sources.” One is Snape’s (or Dumbledore’s)actual source and one is the source that Snape tells V he has. They might be the same, but not necessarily. Mundungus might be one or the other or both. It’s possible that McGonagall is the actual source as she might talk to Dumbledore’s portrait, not realizing D would pass the info on to Snape. No one else in the Order seems to fit unless V thinks Snape’s getting info out of “that brainless oaf, Hagrid.”

I’m not sure where else D would have a portrait. He always eschewed the Ministry, so not likely to have a portrait there (except maybe as head of the Wizengamot) and he was never a healer, so no portrait at St. Mungo’s.

Steve, regarding your first suggestion -it’s possible D might have taken one Order member into his confidence (I doubt he’d let too many know to reduce the risk of info leaking to the wrong people), and it does not appear to have been McGonagall or she would not have tried to kill Snape and chase him from the school in the end. But D might well have used McGonagall unwittingly. Couldn’t you just see his portrait giving her instructions to have the Order move Harry early and then the portrait giving Snape his instructions.

Second suggestion is a possibility. Or maybe Snape gets in via the Shrieking Shack and the Whomping Willow and flies a broomstick directly up to the headmaster’s window (or maybe he can fly in on a broomstick and turn off and on the protection like D does returning from the cave).

Sorry to be late to the party, due to the holiday. Great post and questions, revgeorge!

I think, in DD’s explanation to Harry, he might have been referring Harry’s mind back to his own very recent horror over what he did to his own enemy–Draco–in the boy’s bathroom (where Harry “plunged toward Malfoy, ” crying “No–I didn’t–”) Harry tells Snape that he didn’t understand the spell, otherwise he’d never have used it. DD may have been appealing to Harry’s own understanding of fatally injuring an enemy, his efforts to help, his subsequent remorse and shame, and his sense of honor.

As to Snape’s actual source–what about Aberforth? Sure, Aberforth had a lot of resentment toward Albus, but they’d made some kind of peace; he would likely have been an Order connection. We know that Albus visits the Hog’s Head where Aberforth is barkeep (and in this book Albus takes Harry to the seemingly-empty HH to secretly and safely disapparate). And he has Aberforth watch out for Harry in DH.

Amanda, After Harry casts his Patronus in PoA and Hermione asks him, in a panic, what he did, Harry says “I just saved all our lives”. In addition, previous to this, when the dementor was actually attacking him, Harry says that the dementor was going to finish him first. All this says “death” to me.

Don’t think it really matters anyway. As far as I am concerned, soulless husk is bad enough to qualify for a death omen.

Snape might have been “filching” the signature page of Lily’s letter to Sirius.

It seemed like Snape had been searching the whole place, probably to make sure there was no important info left behind in case the death eaters DID find a way to get in (as they may have after the Ministry escape). Finding the Lily’s photo and letter was an added bonus. And he and Phineas can meet in the castle if Phineas moves to a picture out in a hallway late at night.

I’m surprised Sirius had the letter from Lily there, actually. It would have been sent to him long after he moved out and before he went to Azkaban. I doubt he can take pictures to Azkaban. That means his personal effects must have been preserved somewhere and/or by someone such that he could retrieve them after he escaped (or someone helped retrieve them after he came back to G Place).

One more thing on the letter. Lily Luna. Don’t forget Sirius lived at the Black House for a year during OotP. Perhaps his room had never been cleaned (so no one–Kreacher?– would have to taint themselves). In any case, I can see him during his misery in OotP, comforting himself with his youthful possessions and “good old days” memories, i.e., letters and photos. Perhaps he meant to show such letter sand photos to Harry, along with others, someday.

As to Trelawney, perhaps here is again narrative misdirection. We’ve been trained, via Harry’s third-person limited omniscience, to scorn her and see her as “an old fraud.” Dumbledore doesn’t disrespect her, but doesn’t favor the arts of Divination. Thus we, the readers, actually look for things to discredit her. Yet there is more there than meets the “eye.”

Here’s a question off topic, but hey, I can side-track my own thread, can’t I?

I wonder if Sirius’ mother thought better of him after he was considered to be on LV’s side & a betrayer of blood traitors & mudbloods & a Muggle killer?

Arabella, I was thinking exactly the same thing, that if she thought Sirius was Voldemort’s secret servant, it would rehabilitate him in her eyes and she would save his belongings rather than throw them away.

revgeorge, that’s exactly what I was just thinking about. And Arabella Lily Luna, I agree that Sirius’s new reputation as being in deep with Voldemort would redeem Sirius in his mum’s eyes. That’s why I would guess that she might have been dead by the time Sirius got sent to Azkaban, because her portrait seems to think that Sirius is no good. I don’t know if portraits can change their attitudes after they’ve been done or not; Mrs. Black’s could just reflect her attitudes at the time it was done, so maybe it doesn’t tell us anything. But I’ll guess that someone did gather his personal things from wherever he was living and that those things were sent to the house, and that it was Kreacher, obligated to maintain the family’s possessions, who chucked them into the bedroom. Sirius may or may not have sorted through them, but I don’t suppose it matters.

Hmm Well I was just searching on Google for some Tarot readings of some Tarot reader
and just came across your blog, generally I just only visit blogs and retrieve my required
information but this time the useful information that you posted in this post compelled me
to reply here and appreciate your good work. I just bookmarked your blog