(no subject)

[erastes]

Whilst doing the In-depth Spork of Deathly Hallows we've discovered some very interesting things. Other than the obvious that Harry does nothing (including failing to die) throughout and everything else is done by others, Jo can't use a colon to save her life and thinks sentence structure is something that happens to other people, we have found at least three places where the book - and in one case the entire saga - should have never happened and should have disappeared up its own arsehole.

Idiocy 1. How did they get to Shell Cottage? Bill, we are told, is the Secret Keeper. How is Ron able to tell Harry about the place, and exactly where it is? How is HARRY able to tell Dobby about it, and how then is Dobby able to get there? The only person who can tell anyone is BILL.

Idiocy 2. When Voldemort is looking for Gregorovich he meets a witch in a house. She doesn't help him and he's a bit annoyed. Suddenly some children come running up the passageway and she throws out her arms to protect them from the blast of the AK that he fires at her. She died for them - so why didn't VM revert to Spirit Voldie?

Idiocy 3. Secret Keepers. Jo has said that when a Secret Keeper dies the secret is transferred to those who know the secret. Apply that to October 31st 1981.

--Peter was the Secret Keeper. Note: HE'S NOT DEAD
--Peter told Voldemort. This doesn't make Voldemort a SK.
--Voldemort is reduced to nothing (not dead, but it doesn't matter because he's not a SK)
--So... How does Sirius get there? How does he tell anyone where he is? How does Hagrid know where to find them? How, in fact does anyone see the place at ALL? Harry should have died of starvation and the whole saga could not possibly have happened. In fact - Harry and Hermione could not have seen the house as PETER is NOT DEAD and did not tell them where it is.

Unless anyone's got any thoughts on the subject?

Comments

[amazing-otter.livejournal.com]

*pokes in* I was lurking about, and came across this. So I hope you don't mind me throwing in my two cents, at least on your last point.
I always took it as this: The secret was where James and Lilly were hidden, not the Potters, because at that point, no one knew Harry would be important. So Voldemort kills James and Lilly. This makes the secret null and void, since they were dead. So then Dumbledore could tell whoever he wants about where Harry was, because there was no secret. Does that make any sense? I could be completely off base, but it made sense in my head.
For your other points, I have no idea. Stupid books.

[rwday.livejournal.com]

I admit it's been a while since I read HP canon, but wasn't the important thing about the Potters not James and Lily, but Harry? He (or Neville) was the boy in the prophecy and would have been Voldie's target. Now as I recall, that wasn't widely known, but Dumbledore would have known and I'd think he would insist that the spell protect all of them.

[amazing-otter.livejournal.com]

Augh, you're completely correct. I had my timeline with the prophecy all messed up.

In that case, I have absolutely no idea how any of it would have worked.

Unless the person to cast the secret-keeper charm also has the power to cancel it? That's a total stretch, I know, but maybe?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Welcome! Always nice to see a new face. Nod, RWDay has it right, Harry was the one being protected, so it just can't work. It's all stupid. hope you pop into deadlyhollow from time to time!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

You are right. Although he's special at doing nothing....

Thanks!

[maximvanziel.livejournal.com]

I have never been interested in Harry Potter series, but you(and your community) fired me up! Another way to enjoy books :D

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you are enjoying it, Max!

[asphodeline.livejournal.com]

Lol, yes!! Idiocy one reminds me I didn't put that bit in my chapter 24 spork although I was thinking about it.
Truth be told, I was wondering how the hell they all managed to get there separately and how Harry knew that Hermione was there but didn't have the stamina to read all the other bits first to see if it was already answered. Now I'm reading other sporks, I see it wasn't!!

How come they all got there? How come no one else was able to sort of follow?

Going over this book piece by piece is really highlighting the failure ofhte whole series. So many fabulous plot opportunities are completely wasted.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I wish I knew - i wish I wasn't re-reading it. I read a chapter or two in bed and end up yelling in annoyance.

[midnitemaraud-r.livejournal.com]

With the first, there's a difference between Fidelius and something being unplottable. I mean, with Grimmauld Place, Bellatrix and everyone else knew where it was, they just couldn't get in.

I think it's Flitwick who explains that with the Fidelius, you could look in the windows and the people under the charm would still be hidden. That rather implies that the dwelling is visible, it's the people who are being hidden by the Fidelius. With Grimmauld Place and the Order Headquarters, the secret was that it was the Order Headquarters. I think the particular secret shapes how the Fidelius works.

With Shell Cottage (or say, the Burrow), putting it under Fidelius doesn't erase its existence or knowledge of its location from anyone's memory. Harry was able to go to Grimmauld Place before he knew the secret, and stand outside the place where the house was. Same way they were all able to go to the location of Shell Cottage. They just couldn't go inside.

As for Peter, he was the Secret Keeper, and he betrayed the secret. That's how it broke. Part of the Fidelius is the Keeper's promise to protect - i.e. not betray - the people (or object). That's the whole point of the charm: it's a pact between two parties. If the Keeper breaks the charm... (And as for how 'the charm' knows, I would think it's the same magical logic behind the Unbreakable Vow. It's a promise made, and if the promise is broken, well, with Fidelius, the consequences aren't death, but that's the whole point of choosing a Keeper who can be trusted.)

And Sirius would have already known the Secret - he was most likely there when they did it - he was in on the switch. Dumbledore did not know who the Secret Keeper was, nor did he know the secret, but he already knew where they were - they had been living there already. The charm doesn't erase that knowledge. However, it he had paid them a visit, (or tried to) he wouldn't have been able to see them there, even if he peered into the windows.

That doesn't mean that a few bits aren't quite clear, but it's not as completely off as you were suggesting.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

DD was the secret keeper for Grimmauld, that is said. It was unplottable by the Blacks as far as I remember. The secret could only be divulged by DD to Harry. The Order couldn't tell him where it was, and he couldn't see it until he read DD's note, so one can only assume that it is the revealing of the secret keeprs secret that makes the house visible. Molly (I think, without checking) says that after DD died, all those to whom he had divulged the secret became the secret keepers. So DD telling the secret didn't break the charm. I've never seen anywhere in chat or in canon or on the lexicon about betrayal being key - in fact the lexicon states that although Peter told the secret, VM would not have been able to pass that on to anyone else.

There's no way that Sirius would have known where they were - that would mean that they could have picked him up at any time and veritaserum or torture the truth out of him. He changed with Peter because he didnt want to be the obvious one. Plus lily is writing letters to Sirius, complains about them being viritual prisoners - I didn't get any impression that anyone had been visiting. I get the impression that once a Fidelius is cast anyone who knew that's where people were living would lose the memory of it. Plus the charm can be cast on the people as well as the place which would explain how he could have been pressing his non-existenet nose against the windows.

I don't buy the Shell Cottage thing either, Bill is the secret keeper, so it has to be him to tell Harry where it is. Ron wouldn't have even been able to mention it. As the lexicon says: Snape could refer (at least indirectly) to the fact that a Fidelius Charm applied to the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix, but since he was not the Secret Keeper he could not mention the name of the place

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

I think you're forgetting a few things.

Dumbledore was the Secret Keeper for the Order. He told everyone in the Order--some twenty-odd people--where Grimmauld Place was. Including, I should point out, a man that he knew personally to be a double agent who could let DEs in at any time. The Fidelius was still in effect after DD's death, just spread out more. It wasn't invalidated.

Sirius knew of the switch, yes. That doesn't mean he was there or even needed to be there when Peter became the Secret Keeper, or that he could come visit the Potters after the Fidelius was in effect. Indeed, the fact that Lily was writing letters to Sirius indicates that they were virtual prisoners in their home. "James is getting a bit frustrated shut up here," she says. The only people she mentions as visiting are Peter and Bathilda Bagshot.

(Why Bathilda, I have no idea. I can come up with a few rationalizations, but she shouldn't be able to see or hear the cottage any more than anyone who isn't Peter or Voldemort.)

As for Shell Cottage, Bill is the Secret Keeper there. He can share the information with his brother or with Remus--probably by writing the address down and passing it on to them, as DD did for the Advance Guard. But the Advance Guard, though they knew the address, couldn't tell Harry where they were going, or even write it down. They could only pass on the written address to Harry. When he saw the written address being passed on, then he could see the house, having become, effectively, a Secondary Secret Keeper. Before he read the address, he couldn't.

So Ron should not have been able to tell Harry where Bill and Fleur lived; the Fidelius Charm would prevent him from doing so, as it did with the Advance Guard. And since Ron should not have been able to tell Harry, Harry should not have been able to tell Dobby. Fidelius Charms were established four books ago as being the kind of thing that only a Secret Keeper could break--which means that the people protected by this secret and sharing in the secret aren't able to break it.

So Ron can't tell Harry where Shell Cottage is. Harry can't tell Dobby. Remus can't stand outside Shell Cottage and shout the news to the sky. No one should be able to see the Potters' cottage as long as Peter Pettigrew remains alive.

Obviously, it doesn't work like that in the seventh book. And that, I think, is because Rowling doesn't re-read her own material. She forgot the rules that she'd already established, and she fucked up.

[copperbeech.livejournal.com]

I read things like this and cringe with dread over details I'm overlooking or flat out screwing up in my novel . :|

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't worry. No-one in the world could screw up their own saga in the way she's done. When I first read the book (and HBP less so) I realised there were a few mistakes, and a lot of editing issues, but it was not until we went through so minutely that we realised just how badly she's screwed up. Most people don't seem to care, and that's fine I suppose.

[hansbekhart.livejournal.com]

On 2 ... maybe Spirit Voldie happened because of the sequence of events? Lily sacrifices her life to save Harry, THEN Voldemort tries to kill him. So the protection is put into place, but not ... activated until he directly tries to kill Harry. If he had tried to kill the children in the cottage after their mother was dead, then it would have reduced him to a spirit again, but if he just killed her (or killed them all in one big swoop), then it's meaningless.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Yes, and we have to give the benefit of the doubt because we don't see what happens, Harry only says that he killed everyone but still, it was a daft thing to put in, JKR could easily have left the kids out of it, and she probably only did it for "tension" and forgot her own rules, as she appears to have forgotten so many things.

[slashpine.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad you and gehayi and we happy band of sporkers are going through this with a fine-toothed comb in one hand (and the other holding our noses). So many times last July I was just "WHUT?!".

The Harry-sees-Voldie-kill-ppl scenes (Idiocy 2, e.g.) baffled me completely. However, they were also so utterly irrelevant to the story *as seen directly*, I just skipped over them to keep from going insane :-)

I think JKR not only made up the Secret-Keeper/Fidelius rules anew each time she wrote them, I think she got them mixed up somewhere along the way. Also drives. Me. Insane. Not to mention that it never seemed clear to me how people Apparate to places they've never been. Like the Trio hip-hopping off to London after the wedding, and then (as we've all pointed out in the spork discussion) all around England's woods and to other random new locations, because they surely haven't been all these places before!

BAH. I can't decide which annoys me more in DH, the number of new magic bits JKR made up as she went, or the number of gigantic gaping plot holes she left along the way. It would be really really fun to see fans ask her some of these questions in her public appearances instead of simply pandering to her need for blind worship.

Because then she'd get so snarled up in her inconsistencies she'd either never publish her HP Encyclopedia or it would take years. Either way, keeping her out of fandom's sandbox.

[ellecain.livejournal.com]

Regarding Idiocy 2, I think JKR said that the reason Lily's sacrifice was speshul was because she was the only one to whom the choice of living or dying was offered explicitly. So although Dobby threw himself in front of Harry and that Gregorovitch woman throws herself in front of the kids, it doesn't count because they weren't offered a choice by the killer. I think she said this in the live chat, so I'll have to hunt down the transcript to make sure. Mind you, I think this explanation is bollocks because throwing yourself in front of an AK is throwing yourself in front of a AK - you're still making the choice to sacrifice yourself! So really, I can offer only one explanation - JKR does not think the two acts are identical, and does not think the second type of sacrifice valid. Bad existentialist! No biscuit.

[ellecain.livejournal.com]

Yep, here it is. It wasn't in the live chat but in the PotterCast interview:

It was important for me to say on the website, I never saw this, as in the finale, the deneouement, the moment when Harry faces Voldemort prepared to die and doesn't die-- that isn't like a scientific equation. Harry-- it's not guaranteed, there has to be space, to make Harry truly heroic, for free will. It has to be his choice. The whole thing's his choice. He chooses to sacrifice himself just as Lily chose to sacrifice herself. He chooses to pull himself back to life, and that's his own will and courage. So ultimately, those things, all of them were more important than the magic.

*boggles* So apparently all the other mothers who threw themselves in front of their kids weren't doing it out of choice and free will? Sartre is probably rolling over in his grave.

[crawling-angel.livejournal.com]

These plotholes must make far better reading, hehe.

[florahart]

Jo, in interviews, didn't say the secret transfers. It's worse than that; she said, explicitly in response to the question what happened to the fidelius on GP when DD died, that the secret dies with the secret keeper and cannot be transferred.

http://www.jkrowling.com/textonly/en/faq_poll.cfm

I'm okay with Sirius being able to get there (Peter told him; easy). Ditto Hagrid, perhaps. Arguable: If it was, say, James, that cast the secret keepage on Lily and vice versa, perhaps the charm itself died with them--not the keeper, but the caster. Or something. We don't know who cast it to make DD the keeper for GP, I don't think.

But Shell Cottage? That's a MESS, as is anyone new getting into GP.

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

Proof positive that Rowling's interviews are contradictory and should not be taken as canon. Because this is what it says in Chapter 6 of Deathly Hallows, page 79, UK edition. Mr. Weasley is speaking.

"Mr Weasley had explained that after the death of Dumbledore, their Secret Keeper, each of the people to whom Dumbledore had confided Grimmauld Place's location had become a Secret Keeper in turn.

'And as there are around twenty of us, this greatly dilutes the power of the Fidelius Charm. Twenty times as many opportunities to get the secret out of somebody. We can't expect it to hold much longer.'"

So according to book canon, the secret DOES transfer when a Secret Keeper dies.

[florahart]

Yeah, what really kills me is that that question was asked and answered when the book had to pretty much be in the hands of the printers or nearly, and it was asked very directly, so ...what the hell. I'm sort of guessing that someone pointed out late in the editorial process that she'd completely fucked this up (by having the kids Apparate into the place with someone who couldn't get in, and then have them have to flee because now others could get in) and they tossed in the canon you cite there to make it sort of rational that they could "tell" by means of Apparition. I have no idea how that helps to explain Shell Cottage, though. That whole spell, someone needed to sit her down and make her work out how it worked, because it's not like it's impossible to come up with a coherent structure; it's just, she didn't. Heh.