Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: Ch 12-13

Harry Potter and the First Time Readers

Chapter 12 - Silver and Opals

• Where was Dumbledore and what was he doing?

Q1 - Where was Dumbledore and what was he doing?

Q2 - Is the Half-Blood Prince a dark person?

• Harry rather doubted he would be able to bring off this particular spell; he was still having difficulty with non-verbal spells, something Snape had been quick to comment on in every DADA class. On the other hand, the Prince had proved a much more effective teacher than Snape so far.

Q3 - Do you think Snape really is a good teacher and Harry is just blinded?

Q4 - Is Harry dumb to be practicing these spells on his friends?

Q5 - Harry thinks that the Prince could be his dad, do you think he’s right?

• Harry had pinned Mundungus against the wall of the pub by the throat. Holding him fast with one hand, he pulled out his wand. ‘Harry!’ squealed Hermione. ‘You took that from Sirius’s house,’ said Harry, who was almost nose-to-nose with Mundungus and was breathing in an unpleasant smell of old tobacco and spirits. ‘That had the Black family crest on it.’

Q6 - What is Mundungus stealing from the Black house?

• At once, Katie rose into the air, not as Ron had done, suspended comically by the ankle, but gracefully, her arms outstretched, as though she were about to fly. Yet there was something wrong, something eerie … her hair was whipped around her by the fierce wind, but her eyes were closed and her face was quite empty of expression. Harry, Ron, Hermione and Leanne had all halted in their tracks, watching. Then, six feet above the ground, Katie let out a terrible scream. Her eyes flew open but whatever she could see, or whatever she was feeling, was clearly causing her terrible anguish. She screamed and screamed; Leanne started to scream too, and seized Katie’s ankles, trying to tug her back to the ground. Harry, Ron and Hermione rushed forwards to help, but even as they grabbed Katie’s legs, she fell on top of them; Harry and Ron managed to catch her but she was writhing so much they could hardly hold her. Instead they lowered her to the ground where she thrashed and screamed, apparently unable to recognise any of them.

Q7 - What kind of magic is this?

Q8 - What’s the worst amount of pain you’ve ever been in?

Q9 - Why would someone want to curse an object? What else do you think you could do with objects in the wizarding world?

Q10 - Who gave Katie the necklace and where was Katie delivering it?

Chapter 13 - The Secret Riddle

• ‘Ah,’ said Dumbledore, ‘perhaps she could. But it is my belief – I am guessing again, but I am sure I am right – that when her husband abandoned her, Merope stopped using magic. I do not think that she wanted to be a witch any longer. Of course, it is also possible that her unrequited love and the attendant despair sapped her of her powers; that can happen. In any case, as you are about to see, Merope refused to raise her wand even to save her own life.’
• ‘She wouldn’t even stay alive for her son?’ Dumbledore raised his eyebrows. ‘Could you possibly be feeling sorry for Lord Voldemort?’ ‘No,’ said Harry quickly, ‘but she had a choice, didn’t she, not like my mother –’ ‘Your mother had a choice, too,’ said Dumbledore gently. ‘Yes, Merope Riddle chose death in spite of a son who needed her, but do not judge her too harshly, Harry. She was greatly weakened by long suffering and she never had your mother’s courage. And now, if you will stand …’

Q1 - What does Dumbledore mean that Lily had a choice?

Q2 - It mentions that Dumbledore’s hair was Auburn…is he a Weasley?

• And then –’ Mrs Cole took another swig of gin, slopping a little over her chin this time, ‘on the summer outing – we take them out, you know, once a year, to the countryside or to the seaside – well, Amy Benson and Dennis Bishop were never quite right afterwards, and all we ever got out of them was that they’d gone into a cave with Tom Riddle. He swore they’d just gone exploring, but something happened in there, I’m sure of it. And, well, there have been a lot of things, funny things …’

Q3 - Should Dumbledore have denied entrance for Tom knowing these things?

• ‘I don’t believe you,’ said Riddle. ‘She wants me looked at, doesn’t she? Tell the truth!’ He spoke the last three words with a ringing force that was almost shocking. It was a command, and it sounded as though he had given it many times before. His eyes had widened and he was glaring at Dumbledore, who made no response except to continue smiling pleasantly. After a few seconds Riddle stopped glaring, though he looked, if anything, warier still.
• ‘I can make things move without touching them. I can make animals do what I want them to do, without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who annoy me. I can make them hurt if I want to.’

Q4 - Is it alarming that he is this advanced in magic already?

• ‘I knew I was different,’ he whispered to his own quivering fingers. ‘I knew I was special. Always, I knew there was something.’

Q5 - What do you think of Tom and Dumbledore’s interaction?

• ‘He believed it much quicker than I did – I mean, when you told him he was a wizard,’ said Harry. ‘I didn’t believe Hagrid at first, when he told me.’

Q6 - What’s the difference in Harry and Tom?

• ‘Did you know – then?’ asked Harry. ‘Did I know that I had just met the most dangerous Dark wizard of all time?’ said Dumbledore. ‘No, I had no idea that he was to grow up to be what he is. However, I was certainly intrigued by him. I returned to Hogwarts intending to keep an eye upon him, something I should have done in any case, given that he was alone and friendless, but which, already, I felt I ought to do for others’ sake as much as his.
• ‘Firstly, I hope you noticed Riddle’s reaction when I mentioned that another shared his first name, “Tom”?’ Harry nodded. ‘There he showed his contempt for anything that tied him to other people, anything that made him ordinary. Even then, he wished to be different, separate, notorious. He shed his name, as you know, within a few short years of that conversation and created the mask of “Lord Voldemort” behind which he has been hidden for so long.
• ‘I trust that you also noticed that Tom Riddle was already highly self-sufficient, secretive and, apparently, friendless? He did not want help or companionship on his trip to Diagon Alley. He preferred to operate alone. The adult Voldemort is the same. You will hear many of his Death Eaters claiming that they are in his confidence, that they alone are close to him, even understand him. They are deluded. Lord Voldemort has never had a friend, nor do I believe that he has ever wanted one
• ‘And lastly – I hope you are not too sleepy to pay attention to this, Harry – the young Tom Riddle liked to collect trophies. You saw the box of stolen articles he had hidden in his room. These were taken from victims of his bullying behavior, souvenirs, if you will, of particularly unpleasant bits of magic. Bear in mind this magpie-like tendency, for this, particularly, will be important later.

Q7 - Why is this important?

Q8 - What happened to the ring?