He created a construct of dust that looked like a decaying Dumbledore that would (I believe) utter actual phrases, reappear every time someone came in, and only disappear with certain words.

Really advanced shit.

I have my own question, are spells that make a person only say certain things canon? In rereading On the Way to Greatness, I found a reference to a spell that made someone recite poetry in gobbledegook for an entire day. That sounds incredibly complex and I wonder if it's just an adopted concept from European fairy tales (a German one about two sisters if I recall correctly, the cruel one's words spewed forth snakes and the kind one's gems) or if there's canon support for this.

 

When Harry first comes across the Diary in Myrtle's bathroom during CoS, Ron tells him to be careful since it could be dangerous, claiming to have heard of a book which cursed the reader to speak only in limericks for the rest of their life.

Of course, you could argue that it could have been his father exaggerating, to try and drill into Ron's head how dangerous dealing with unknown magical items could be, but I think that's the only example we have of spells directly influencing the way someone speaks.

 

It depends on what you're using it for, and what style guide your following. For instance, punctuation is not included in scare quotes or quotes that set off words for irony (and I've always found it best not to end a sentence with a word in scare quotes just to stay away from this issue."

If you're quoting text (or indirect speech), then a period or comma goes inside the quotation mark, but a semicolon or colon goes outside the quotation mark. A question mark or emdash can go both inside or outside, depending on whether it is more applicable to the sentence as a whole, or the material in the quote.

Source: Turabian style guide (I believe Chicago Manual of Style follows the same rules).

 

Not sure if this has been covered before, but there's a good chance it has been considering how many times the Elder Wand stuff has been debated. Regardless, my question is this - why didn't Voldemort become the Elder Wand's master when he hit Harry with the AK in the forest?

We know that Harry died shortly, and he could have stayed dead if he chose to according to JKR. Malfoy became the master by only using a disarming charm, Grindelwald possibly just by stealing it (?) and Voldemort seemed to think having Nagini kill Snape would suffice, so why didn't temporarily killing Harry make him the master?

 

Harry went willingly, and on top of it, in the end he didn't die and in that sense, he defeated Voldemort's curse . . . twice.

 

Pretty sure Dumbledore willingly took Malfoy's expelliarmus, unless you think a sixth year could take on the most talented wizard of the century. Neither did Malfoy's spell kill him, so from what I gather the only requirement is beating the other person. I'd certainly say Voldemort came out on top in the forest.

I don't think either of those are good enough reasons for the Elder Wand to stay loyal to Harry, considering how it's been proven to be extremely easy to win over it's loyalty. Voldemort straight up bested Harry, far more so than Malfoy did Dumbledore in any case.

 

Voldemort tried to use the Elder Wand to kill Harry. It didn't work because the Wand wouldn't truly harm its master.

 

You'd be wrong, evidently. Voldemort tried to kill him using the Elder Wand, which he hadn't yet earned. As a result, he didn't kill him, and so didn't beat him. You can't earn the right to use the Elder Wand by using the Elder Wand.

 

Didn't Harry explain to Voldemort that the reason Malfoy became the Elder Wand's master was not because he had disarmed Dumbledore but because he had arranged the Death Eater attack on the school and essentially set up Dumbledore's death? At that point, whoever killed Dumbledore didn't matter, since the Wand recognized Malfoy as the one ultimately responsible for Dumbledore's defeat.

Extending that same logic, the Wand probably concluded that Voldemort failed to defeat Harry in the Forest because whether he actually died or not was essentially left to Harry. As Harry chose not to die, the Wand didn't think Voldemort had won, and thus had no right being his master.

 

In that case, wouldn't Voldemort be the one responsible, since he was the one to make Malfoy do that?

 

And Dumbledore was already dead due to Voldemort's horcruxes and the actual killing was merely a formality.

 

It's been awhile since I read HBP but I recall Dumbledore using his wand to freeze Harry in place as Malfoy busted through the door and in his weakened state he wasn't able to deflect Malfoy's disarming spell in time. Malfoy unarmed him, and though Dumbledore wanted to wait for Snape to appear to murder him but in fact destroy the wands power. Thus Malfoy beat Dumbledore's plan and he defeated Dumbledore in a very brief duel. (Even if Dumbledore was weakened it still counted)

 

No, because it was Malfoy's plan, not Voldemort's. Malfoy conceived, planned, prepared and executed it - Voldemort was divorced from the proceedings, and only acted as the initial trigger. Since all the work was Malfoy's, the Elder Wand decided that the reward was as well.

Taking into consideration the fact that Grindelwald supposedly stole the Elder Wand and still became it's master, we can conclude that it also considers intelligence and trickery to be equally valid methods as using brute force, and will change master accordingly. Malfoy directly attacked something under Dumbledore's protection, and arguably the thing he wished to guard the most - that was a victory far greater than anything Voldemort had managed, so the Wand decided Malfoy was a more apt choice.

Though, that's all speculation, on account of the fact that we don't have much idea about how wandlore works.

 

Nay, good sir. Or at least, not in a way that made it less of a defeat. It was either that he just too slow at the time, despite attempting to pull off both actions, or that he had one moment, as Harry moved toward the door under the Cloak and Draco burst through it, to choose between immobilizing Harry and defending against Draco's spell. He chose to immobilize Harry.

I think the thing is that so long as he wanted to save Harry (by immobilizing him), he wouldn't have been able to stop Malfoy's spell. He chose to take it in that moment, but it hadn't been a part of the plan. He wanted Snape to kill him as planned, but as it was premeditated, he would have chosen that death and therefore remained undefeated. He did not plan for Draco to show up, and being disarmed seems to be a surefire way of losing the Wand's allegiance. So when Draco arrived (and Disarmed him after putting him in a situation where he had to choose between the plan and Harry's life), this event having been unaccounted for by Dumbledore, that whole part of the plan essentially fell through.

He saves Harry by immobilizing him, but he does so knowing that it will cost him the Wand. He appears to know that facet of the plan has gone sour, and apparently decides that keeping Harry alive for the moment is more important than breaking the power of the Wand forever.

I don't think it was ever confirmed one way or the other, however, that Dumbledore's plan would have been enough to break the power of the Wand. It might still have passed to Snape.

I think he meant to destroy the Wand's power, but the contingency plan would have been that, should his attempt to break it fail, it would pass to Snape.

 

Question: When people agree with someone with words "Hear, hear!"

Is it actually "Hear, hear" or "Here, here?"

What do these mean, anyway? How does repeating those words mean you agree with the speaker?

 

see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hear,_hear

 

Edit: ninja'd

 

Regarding the Elder Wand bollocks, I'd think Dumbledore's intent mattered here (i.e., you can also give up control of the Elder Wand intentionally).

 

Wrong thread.

 

Is the invisibility cloak an actual cloak, or it's just a large silvery blanket that you drape over yourself?