Mark Reads ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’: Chapter 16

In the sixteenth chapter of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Harry spends time with the Weasley family during Christmas, where he has an eye-opening conversation with two characters this book has largely ignored. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to read Harry Potter.

CHAPTER 16: A VERY FROSTY CHRISTMAS

Now this is you how you give an info dump via your characters!

You’ll recall in the last chapter that I was a tad disappointed that Rowling, again, relied on Harry hiding underneath the Invisibility Cloak to get information about other characters and the plot. Here, though, involves a technique that’s more in line with her theme of Harry growing up and with the world around him treating him as an adult.

Following the events of Slughorn’s party, Harry shares his concerns about Malfoy and Snape; Hermione and Ron are more inclined to believe him this time around, but they’re still unsure whether Harry is completely right.

Deciding not to keep such things to himself, as he’d done many times in earlier novels, he tells Mr. Weasley what happened during the Christmas eve party. As expected, Mr. Weasley counters that Snape is most likely pretending to help Malfoy in order to gain information from Dumbledore.

And that’s when Remus Lupin finally speaks up:

• ”It isn’t our business to know,” said Lupin unexpectedly. He had turned his back on the fire and now faced Harry across Mr. Weasley. “It’s Dumbledore’s business. Dumbledore trusts Severus, and that ought to be good enough for all of us.”

The issue of trust comes up again. On top of that, we have to also consider how many times Harry’s been wrong. Oh, and there’s that whole entire chapter that’s devoted specifically towards messing with our brains. I don’t know what’s happening anymore OH GOD.

• ”I neither like nor dislike Severus,” said Lupin. “No, Harry, I am speaking the truth,” he added, as Harry pulled a skeptical expressing. “We shall never be bosom friends, perhaps after all that happened between James and Sirius and Severus, there is too much bitterness there. But I do not forget that during the year I taught at Hogwarts, Severus made the Wolfsbane Potion for me every month, made it perfectly, so that I did not have to suffer as I usually do at the full moon.”

And I think this is ultimately a very good point. That also doesn’t help me figure out how I feel about anything.

• ”You are determined to hate him, Harry,” said Lupin with a faint smile. “And I understand; with James as your father, with Sirius as your godfather, you have inherited an old prejudice. By all means tell Dumbledore what you have told Arthur and me, but do not expect him to share your view of the matter; do not even expect him to be surprised by what you tell him. It might have been on Dumbledore’s orders that Severus questioned Draco.”

This might be all the evidence I need that not only calms my nerves for this book, and also continues to prove that Lupin is my favorite character in the series. I did wonder, however, why he seemed so…sick? Tired? Ragged? But Rowling (finally) answers this:

• ”What have you been up to lately?” Harry asked Lupin, as Mr. Weasley buslted off to fetch the eggnog, and everybody stretched and broke into conversation.

  “Oh, I’ve been underground,” said Lupin. “Almost literally. That’s why I haven’t been able to write, Harry; sending letters to you would have been something of a giveaway.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve been living among my fellows, my equals,” said Lupin. “Werewolves,” he added, at Harry’s look of incomprehension. “Nearly all of them are on Voldemort’s side. Dumbledore wanted a spy and here I was…ready-made.”

WHAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• ”You haven’t heard of him?” Lupin’s hands closed convulsively in his lap. “Fenrir Grayback is, perhaps, the most savage werewolf alive today. He regards it as his mission in life to bite and to contaminate as many people as possible; he wants to create enough werewolves to overcome the wizards. Voldemort has promised him prey in return for his services. Greyback specializes in children….Bite them young, he says, and raise them away from their parents, raise them to hate normal wizards. Voldemort has threatened to unleash him upon people’s sons and daughters; it is a threat that usually produces good results.”

  Lupin paused and then said, “It was Greyback who bit me.”

What!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• ”Yes. My father had offended him. I did not know, for a very long time, the identity of the werewolf who had attacked me; I even felt pity for him, thinking that he had no control, knowing by then how it felt to transform. But Greyback is not like that. At the full moon, he positions himself close to victims, ensuring that he is near enough to strike. He plans it all. And this is the man Voldemort is using to marshal the werewolves. I cannot pretend that my particular brand of reasoned argument is making much headway against Greyback’s insistence that we werewolves deserve blood, that we ought to revenge ourselves on normal people.”

JESUS. BLOODY. CHRIST. Oh god, shit is so real in this war. Also: Lupin can I please just hug you? I mean, seriously, could the man’s story be any more tragic or depressing? Wait, don’t answer that. :/

Christmas day brings the second (and, actually, in hindsight, third) unexpected guest to the Weasley household. And like Harry’s conversation with Lupin, we learn more information simply through honesty.

I will admit to being completely surprised by Percy showing up for Christmas and I’m sure Mrs. Weasley was more ecstatic than the pages let on. It did bother me, however, how disingenuous the entire thing seemed, given that Harry realized Percy came with the Minister, Scrimgeour, who was pretty determined to talk with Harry.

Their conversation is one of the most subtext-rich bits of dialogue in the entire series and demonstrates Rowling’s incredible grasp of the nuances of life during wartime. Much like what we went through here in the States under President Bush, Scrimgeour is more concerned with appearances and media support than actually contributing towards any sort of significant progress against Voldemort. (For the record, I realize that analogy doesn’t work entirely, considering that the war against Voldemort is necessary and sanctioned, where the Iraq war….well, it simply wasn’t.)

When Harry quickly discovers the Minister’s real interest in visiting on Christmas day, he wastes no time calling him out.

• ”But if I keep running in and out of the Ministry,” said Harry, still endeavoring to keep his friendly, ”won’t that seem as though I approve of what the Ministry’s up to?”

  “Well,” said Scrimgeour, frowning slightly, “well, yes, that’s partly why we’d like—“

  “No, I don’t think that’ll work,” said Harry pleasantly. “You see, I don’t like some of the things the Ministry’s doing. Locking up Stan Shunpike, for instance.”

Bravo, Harry, for making a difficult situation even more difficult in the name of doing what’s right. (I’m reminded of a certain conversation between Harry and Dumbledore.) And this cannot not have been an easy thing to say to someone in a position of authority, so I admire Harry for it.

• “Some would say it’s your duty to be used by the Ministry!”

  “Yeah, and others might say it’s your duty to check that people really are Death Eaters before you put them in prison,” said Harry, his temper rising now. “You’re doing what Barty Crouch did. You never get it right, you people, do you? Either we’ve got Fudge, pretending everything’s lovely while people get murdered right under his nose, or we’ve got you, chucking the wrong people into jail and trying to pretend you’ve got ‘the Chosen One’ working for you!”

I love Harry so much right now. And this is such a damning (though admittedly ambiguous) assault from Rowling on governments who chose to protect their own appearance and reputation over protecting their people.

• ”Well, it is clear to me that he has done a very good job on you,” said Scrimgeour, his eyes cold and hard behind his wire-rimmed glasses. “Dumbledore’s man through and through, aren’t you, Potter?”

  “Yeah, I am,” said Harry. “Glad we straightened that out.”

  And turning his back on the Minister of Magic, he strode back toward the house.

This is an important moment for Harry, both as a growing adult and in the context of this chapter. Has Harry decided that trusting Dumbledore is all that he needs?

Time to read on and find out more.