HBP: Chapter 30 - The White Tomb
Man these kids are lucky every other year they get out of taking finals! (CoS, GoF, HBP). How do they learn anything? Did Ginny still have to take her OWLS?
"Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny were spending all of their time together. The beautiful weather seemed to mock them... and hour by hour, he put off saying the thing that he knew he must say, doing what he knew was right to do, because it was too hard to forgo his best source of comfort." (634) Is it really the right thing for Harry to do to break things off with Ginny or is Harry just playing the part of being a hero again? Dumbledore always tells him his greatest strength is his ability to love so why deny yourself of that Harry?
"They're still looking for Snape but no sign... They won't find Snape till they find Voldemort, and seeing as they've never managed to do that in all this time..." (635) So where is Lord Voldemort hiding? Any one check the bookshelves at Flourish and Blotts? There cant be that many places he can hide... how actively is the ministry looking for him? Where is Snape now? Near Voldemort as Harry suspects or are Harry's theories wrong? Where is Draco? Must be a lot of good hiding spots in England...
Harry is sad that he has to finish what he and Dumbledore set out to do together on his own... When exactly did Dumbledore include Harry in things? Usually we were left in the dark on these matters... Does Harry possess the skills to track down and destroy the remaining Horcruxes? Are they really what we should be focusing on or are we being led astray from what we need to be looking for?
We know how important Harry's dreams can be so I find this distrubing... "his dreams were thick with cups, lockets, and mysterious objects that he could not quite reach, though Dumbledore helpfully offered Harry a rope ladder that turned to snakes the moment he began to climb..." (636)
"Harry had not spared Malfoy much thought. His animosity was all for Snape, but he had not forgotten the fear in Malfoy's voice on that tower top, nor the fact that he had lowered his wand before the other Death Eaters arrived. Harry did not believe that Malfoy would have killed Dumbledore. He despised Malfoy still for his infatuation with the Dark Arts, but now the tiniest drop of pity mingled with his dislike." (640) Draco was obsessed with the Dark Arts? Does he really care about the Dark Arts or was it an act to survive in his family? Imagine what Lucius Malfoy would do to his son if he found out he didn't want to follow in his family's traditions... all I can see is Lucius beating Dobby again... I always new I pitied Draco but I wasn't sure why... I always sorta guessed this was the path Draco would take and this was my first proud moment of predicting events in the Harry Potter series.
Wow Grawp underwent a miraculous transition... He was uncontrolable and very dangerous at the end of OotP... now he's almost human-like... what happened? We missed something... will he prove to be a useful ally? What role does he have left to play... must be something since he has been included in the movies.
During the funeral "White smoke spiraled into the air and made strange shapes: Harry thought for one heart-stopping moment that he saw a phoenix fly joyfully into the blue, but next second the fire had vanished. " (645) Is this an important moment? Dumbledore has always had a strange relationship with phoenixes... he was able to have Fawkes as a pet and his patronus is a phoenix. What does this image of the phoenix mean?
The white tomb that Dumbledore's body is in at the end of HBP reminds me alot of the scenes of Aslan's death and rebirth in the Chronicles of Narnia... are there any clues to what will happen in book 7 there? Should we be suspicious if any cracks appear in the white tomb?
Will Harry really never return to Hogwarts? I find that hard to believe. There might still be information and people he will need to fulfill his mission there. It seems really unlikely that we will never return to Hogwarts. Harry says that he will go to Godric's Hollw after staying at the Dursleys. What will he find there? Anything important?
"...in spite of everything, in spite of the dark and twisting path he saw stretching ahead for himself, in spite of the final meeting with Voldemort he knw must come, whether in a month, in a year, or in ten, he felt his heart lift at the thought that there was still one last golden day of peace left to enjoy with Ron and Hermione." (652) Now with Ginny too? Could they really have a day of peace? Hope nothing goes wrong with the wedding...