Hi Alice,

That was a lovely chapter summary and had me thinking about all sorts of
possibilities which I wouldn't otherwise have noticed.

I'll start by posting a response on the chapter in general, and then tackle some
of your questions in a separate post.


This is the chapter in which the trio learn the methods by which Voldemort
intends to gain power. We see the extent to which his henchmen have managed to
infiltrate the office of power, the Ministry of Magic, without most of the
employees recognising what is going on. The will of the Ministry of Magic has
effectively been diverted to serve the aims of Voldemort and most of the people
who are lending their aid to
his cause have no idea that they are serving the magical world's equivalent of
Satan.

The rose is symbolic of purity of heart, and here the symbol is being abused.
The pamphlet picture shows an innocent rose being abused, through the use of
force, in activity intended to crush it, with the aim of personal gain, with the
aim masquerading as altruism. The Ministry are accusing others of what they are
setting out to do themselves. Most of the Ministry employees probably aren't
aware that they are doing this. They don't realise that all our perceptions are
internal, and the qualities we see in others are those that we cannot currently,
for one reason or another, acknowledge in ourselves, being unable to take a
suficiently detached view.

Umbridge, as a toad, represents the unworked alchemical prima materia, and she
is not applying any alchemical processes to herself, instead she is just just
window-dressing by adding a decorative velvet bow. All her effort is going into
making the outside of the package attractive, with doillies, cute kitten plates
and pink bows, while the inside remains unaffected, and is corrupt But I don't
know what Pius Thicknesse, as a crab, represents alchemically. Any ideas?

I'd also very much like to know why the Ministry offices are raining. Jo could
have used all sorts of other disuptive mischief, but she chose rain. Why?

Under Pius Thicknesse's reign the word 'Mudblood,' clearly a rude word in Book
2, has become sufficiently acceptable to appear on the front of a Ministry
pamphlet.

'Rage reared in him like a snake' when he saw Moody's eye and the use to which
it had been put. The way Jo Rowling hs phrased this reminds me of Harry's
possession by Voldemort in Book 5. It seems pretty clear that Jo is not
endorsing Harry's anger, even while she understands the reason for it.

It surprised me that the Ministry haven't made membership of the Order of the
Phoenix a punishable offence. Why not?

Umbridge has written 'To be punished' on a note attached to her pinup poster of
Harry - Undesirable No 1? It seems that Umbridge does desire him, the note
suggests, for a specific purpose. There is more than just willingness to serve
the Ministry and the Minister here: Umbridge gets personal gratification out of
inflicting corporal punishment on others. By itself, this inclination is not
evil, it is a quality which many millions of people among us possess. The
difference is whether we choose to act on it, as Dumbledore pointed out to Harry
in Book 2 in one of his memorable speeches, 'It is our choices, Harry, that show
what we truly are, far more than our abilities.'

Then we switch to a view of another desire, also represented with a picture.,
the photograph of two excited teenage boys.

When Harry sees Dumbledore looking at him from across the office, he momentarily
thinks that he is looking into a mirror, the mirror in which he saw the flash
of blue eye in chapter 2, which he took to be Dumbledore's eye and which
eventually turns out to be that of his. brother, Aberforth. If Moody's eye is
pineal gland symbolism, and it is bright blue, then Albus' eye colour must
always have symbolised short bursts of activity in the pineal gland throughout
the books, and the same must surely apply to Aberforth's eye, at its most
powerful in chapter 28, the Missing Mirror. And since that chapter is about
revealing the hidden tunnel into Hogwarts, it looks to me as if this reading
fits pretty well.

Ron has got so much into his role as Reginald Cattermole that he doesn't
recognise 'Runcorn' Harry when he meets him in the lift.

Harry instinctively does the right thing. Choosing to look for the locket at the
Ministry of Magic, rather than at Umbridge's home, responding to Mr Weasley in
the lift, in the courtroom when he realises what is about to happen to Mary
Cattermole and, as Alice points out, as they make their escape in the lifts. He
is always awake to the full range of possibilities offered by each moment. He
has great presence of mind, which enables him to make the right decision
instinctively. This is because he isn't always indulging in thought: he simply
pays attention, and so the whole of his perception chooses the right action each
time, not just the little part of it that can be spared from the chatter that
goes on continually inside most people's heads. We rarely see him indulging in
that kind of thinking at all, and it shows in the results he achieves.

Incidentally, Cattermole is the name of a character in Dorothy Sayers' novel
Gaudy Night, and in that novel Cattermole is also someone who lacks the courage
to free herself from the situation she finds herself in, similarly driven there
through pressure from others who are seeking self-gratification. The heroine of
the story (in that case, rather than the hero) points out to her what she should
do to change her situation, in order to escape. A similar parallel, another
'god in the machine' showing the path to freedom.

Harry is moved to help Mary Cattermole because she is quite clearly innocent and
truthful in her story at the trial, whereas Umbridge the Inquisitor, Harry
recognises, is not, lying about the origin of the locket. This contrast moves
him to action where the plight of the would-be son of Arkie Alderton does not.
It isn't the underdog that is being saved here, but truth that is being
rewarded. 'Arkie Alderton Junior' is meeting corruption with corruption, whereas
Mary Elizabeth (the two Biblical New Testament cousins, by the way) is meeting
corruption with innocence and purity.

The plight of the Ministry of Magic has been brought about because minor
corruption leads to greater corruption. If the magical civil servants of the
Ministry had been 'good and faithful' servants instead of taking advantage of
their positions in the Ministry to feather their own nests in one way or
another, then Voldemort's supporters would never have been able to gain a
foothold, let alone the reins of government. A tiny amount of corruption grows,
and is enough to bring down the whole edifice eventually. And this is why the
trio have to abandon Grimmauld Place when Yaxley gains a foothold in it. An
equivalent to the Biblical 'Come out of her, oh My people' is going on here,
and the trio find themselves, like the Israelites, leaving Grimmauld Place, the
equivalent of 'Egypt,' for the camping trip, the equivalent of the desert.


Chris

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