Not Listening...

"Boy," said Dad, "Harry sure doesn't listen very well, does he?" I asked what inspired this remark, and he said, "He keeps saying 'Voldemort'!" That he does. And, really, it would be silly for him not to. Maybe by the end of book seven, Ron will be able to say it too... But the funny thing is that what Dad said could apply to dozens of situations in the series. Harry certainly has, as Dumbledore says, "a certain disregard for the rules," as well as a stubborn refusal to entertain alternate perspectives once he's made up his mind about something. Even with Spinner's End in the back of my mind, I found myself a bit exasperated with Harry's Draco tunnel vision in HBP. Heck, I even did this time around, though if he hadn't clung to those suspicions, things probably would have gone pretty badly at Hogwarts while he was away with Dumbledore... I guess I would say that in most cases, Harry's not "listening very well" ends up all right, but I do think he might benefit from making more of an effort to listen sometimes.

Dad also was surprised that Ron hadn't gotten detention after the Norbert incident. I reminded him that Ron was in the infirmary, but I too had been surprised upon re-reading, because I remembered the scene from the movie and was sure Ron was around. I imagine that the moviemakers were thinking the same thing: "Where's Ron?" He's involved in just about every other incident with Harry in the book, so it's strange not to have him there. Instead, we have Neville, who got rather short-changed in the first three films. And it's good to have him in this important scene; the more I think about it, the more I realize how active he was in the first book. We meet him on the train; by the time they have their first flying lesson, Harry is defending him against Malfoy, leading to his being made Seeker; he stands up to Draco, and later to Harry, Hermione and Ron; he goes in the Forbidden Forest with Harry, Hermione and Draco... He really is there nearly as much as Ron and Hermione, if not quite as noticed. I'm a little worried about him, because I do think he will have a significant contribution to make in Deathly Hallows. I could actually envision him saving Harry in the 11th hour - but I'd hate for it to come at the expense of his life...