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How come she is Harry's only living relative? Doesn't she have any other family? What happened to her parents? She mentioned being bothered that they were so proud of Lilly. What if they were among the muggles that were killed by Voldemort? That would account why she is so suspicious and scared of the magical world.
Think about it...to begin with we have Lilly who is pretty and smart and talented and there is horse-faced, awkward Petunia already feeling all Jan Brady about it.
Then it turns out Lilly has magical powers.
And their parents are delighted about it.
So Petunia is jealous, feels left out. lilly gets all the attention and she gets to go to a special school where she does really well and she is popular.
Then Voldermort becomes really powerful. Bad things happen that most muggles might have thought were accidents or naturals disasters but bcause of Lilly Petunia knows they are magic-related. Now she finally has found a fault in Lilly, because she is part of this world!
Somehow her parents end up dead because of an affiliation with this.
I think this could account for Petunia's attitude. JK's characters are very well rounded, the good guys have flaws and the bad guys have reasons, I don't think the Dursleys are just mean for the sake of having Harry have a bad home life, I'm sure there is more to it.
If they never gave the magical world a chance, and all they are really familiar with is bad stuff, then it makes sense that they are so scared and don't know how to deal with Harry.
Think about it...to begin with we have Lilly who is pretty and smart and talented and there is horse-faced, awkward Petunia already feeling all Jan Brady about it.
Then it turns out Lilly has magical powers.
And their parents are delighted about it.
So Petunia is jealous, feels left out. lilly gets all the attention and she gets to go to a special school where she does really well and she is popular.
Then Voldermort becomes really powerful. Bad things happen that most muggles might have thought were accidents or naturals disasters but bcause of Lilly Petunia knows they are magic-related. Now she finally has found a fault in Lilly, because she is part of this world!
Somehow her parents end up dead because of an affiliation with this.
I think this could account for Petunia's attitude. JK's characters are very well rounded, the good guys have flaws and the bad guys have reasons, I don't think the Dursleys are just mean for the sake of having Harry have a bad home life, I'm sure there is more to it.
If they never gave the magical world a chance, and all they are really familiar with is bad stuff, then it makes sense that they are so scared and don't know how to deal with Harry.
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Miami
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Sun, July 25, 2004 - 10:16 PMI like your reasoning a lot. I think it's been obvious that Petunia was fiercely jealous of Lily, but it never occured to me to think that perhaps Harry's maternal grandparents may have been killed by death eaters. That certainly would add another level of resentment and fear.
Let me take it a bit further though. JKR said in an interview some time ago that someone will do magic who has never done magic before. Since then, I've been trying to figure out who that may be. I have wondered whether Petunia might be a squib with some trace ability at magic. We know that more than one child of muggle parents can be magical (the Creevey brothers, for instance, are muggle born).
If Petunia had managed to squelch whatever magic she possesed as a child, she would feel justified in trying to "rid the boy of that nonsense."
Not to get political in this tribe, but I see it as a sort of analogy to the ex-gay ministries. They're so certain that because *they* were able to sublimate their sexual drives that every other gay person can as well and they are as *vehement* in their convictions as the Dursleys. -
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Mon, July 26, 2004 - 7:30 AMwell made analogy-
I was also wondering if Petunia would turn out to be the one able to do magic. -
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Tue, July 27, 2004 - 12:57 PMI'm currently on my 6th reread of OotP, and I've been wondering this same thing about Petunia. I have a feeling that maybe she does have some magic ability, but because of being in Lily's shadow, she's ignored it. That would make her justified in trying to rid Harry of it, at least in her mind. Then again, I'm still wondering why, if she disliked her sister so much, she would go to such lenghts as to keep Harry. She was told by DD that as long as Harry had somewhere to call home, that was inhabited by his mother's relatives, he would be safe from V. If she didn't have some kind of connection with the wizarding world, and if she really hated her sister, why would she have bothered? The more I read, the more I'm convinced that it could well be Petunia who ends up doing magic. That's a much better story line than it being Filch. -
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Tue, July 27, 2004 - 4:39 PMI'm all for Petunia being the one with the magical powers, makes a great story and makes it so that Harry has a connection with his family again!
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Wed, July 28, 2004 - 8:56 AMBetter story line? Pisshaw! If Filch could do majik then he could really punish the kids at Hogwarts - turning them into a broom so that he can sweep up their messes. He could also help out the bad guys more which he always seems more inclined to do. Yep., Filch with power would be fun.
I don't think Petunia "went to lengths" to keep Harry. She kept him in a broom closet and never gave him anything. That's not to hard to do. -
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Wed, July 28, 2004 - 9:29 AMWell, it's true that the Dursleys were exceedingly abusive of Harry, but I find it hard to believe that that was always so. When he was a baby living with them, they must've done the minimum amount of work that goes into that - changing diapers, toilet training, feedings, etc. Petunia did spend an afternoon dying Duddykin's old school uniform for Harry before he got his first Hogwarts letter.
Really, it would've been much simpler for them to give Harry away to an orphanage and forget the whole sordid affair altogether.
There was a greater reason, somewhere in there, that caused them to keep Harry in the first place.
Filch, on the other hand, if he DOES demonstrate magic (and lord knows he's been trying to with the Quikspell courses), wouldn't have nearly enough ability to transfigure a human (which is, as we learned in the books, a NEWT level charm). And besides which, Dumbledore would never allow him to carry out his schemes against the children.
Then too, another possibility is Mrs. Figg. But she's also tried to do magic all her life with no success.
Really, the only non-magical characters we know who have tried hard to deny any connection with magic, who have NOT tried to make ANY spells, are the Dursleys.
I'm not trying to take the wind outta your sails, Holli. :) Just trying to predict based on what we know so far...
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Tue, July 27, 2004 - 8:30 PMPetunia was my first thought too when I heard someone would be the one to do magic. Dudley would be really interesting too. So upseting to everybody: the Dursleys would have to deal with their precious little boy being what they hate/fear the most and Harry would have to deal with magical harrasement from him. -
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Wed, July 28, 2004 - 7:31 AMtheir precious duddlykins would be a wizard! -
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Re: Petunia Dursley
Wed, July 28, 2004 - 1:03 PMThanks again Steve! That's exactly what I meant when I said that the Dursley's went to lenghts to keep Harry. They dislike the wizarding world so much, and indeed Lily, that it would have been much simpler for them to just send him to an orphanage and pretend even more that he never existed. They've been very bad in their treatment of Harry, but they still provided a home for him.
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