I'm pretty sure there is a deleted comment somewhere causing our comments to be taken out of context. I was responding to someone who questioned why the potion in PS was able to fireproof clothes instead of only the person.

 

I have a quick question- in many fanfics James is shown to be a transfiguration prodigy whereas Lily is a Charms mistress or prodigy. Does this have any basis in canon, or is it a WOG addition? Or is it a purely fanon concept?

The only canon argument on the subject that I remember is Ollivander stating that their wands were supposed to be suited to their respective subjects. Surely that alone does not make them masters or prodigies?

 

It's a combination of two facts:

1. "The wand chooses the wizard" means that the wand reflects the nature of the wizard. So yes, we can anticipate that James' best subject was Transfiguration and Lily's was Charms.

Of course, that alone doesn't make them prodigies, because even idiots will have a "best subject". That's why fact #2 is so important:

2. Lily and James were high achieving all-rounders.

So, they're talented in general, and we know the subjects in which they're even more talented.

 

Do we have any canonical evidence of this? We saw Slughorn wax poetics about Lily's abilities, and Hagrid probably mentioned them to be talented too, but I would hardly consider their opinions to be unbiased. I am fairly sure both of them would be making grand stories about Harry's skills down the road as well.

As far as I know, there is very little canon evidence showing either Lily or James to be "high achieving all-rounders". For all we know, James could be the standard school bully whose greatest talent was turning into a fairly useless herbivore, and Lily could be a talentless whore who had somehow managed to seduce Slughorn.

While I'm not an expert in HP canon, there is very little to show that either Lily or James were anything more than average students. We do know that they were useless duelists- neither of them even attempted to put a fight when Voldemort broke into their house. I cannot imagine canon Harry dying without at least trying to fight.

 

1. They were Head Boy and Head Girl, which only goes to students of high academic achievement.

2. We know James (and Sirius) breezed through their OWLs, finding the tests easy without even studying.

3. Marauder's Map, animagi.

4. Lily was great at Potions and she almost certainly would have been better at Charms.

5. Lily was consciously controlling her magic before Hogwarts, a trait we've only seen otherwise in Tom Riddle.

Slughorn wasn't biased. The whole reason why he loved Lily in the first place was her talent.

And being ambushed in a location you believed completely secure doesn't really say anything about one's duelling ability.

 

I'm not sure why potions couldn't be Lily's best subject. There are no wands best for potions after all, and its not like a bad wand is going to pick her just because she's good at potions. We don't know potions was Lily's best subject, but I would give it equal odds to charms.

 

1. Is it canon that the head boy and head girl positions are chosen based on academics? There could be a lot of factors in that decision- the foremost being that both of them were pretty much poster children for the "light side" in the war. Dumbledore made Ron a prefect over Harry, so academics clearly isn't the biggest criteria here. Admittedly, they would still have to be decent at academics - so there goes my "talentless whore" theory

2. Errr.... I remember James bragging about his DADA exam. I am not sure whether its mentioned that he breezed through his OWLs. Plus, James seems to be very much the type to brag about everything.

3.We don't know about any talent requirements to become an animagus. We do know that neither Voldemort nor Dumbledore are animagi (or atleast, aren't shown to be animagi in canon), so it could be a fairly useless talent, or it could be an ability you are just born with.

I prefer to count the Marauder's map as a product of serendipity rather than talent (as shown in Santi's fic). It would better explain why Dumbledore did not attempt to create a similar map as well.

4.Slughorn thought Harry to be great at potions as well. So there you go. And there is abolutely *nothing* saying she would have to better at charms.

5.Lily is the only witch as far as we know. How many young childhoods have been explored in canon anyway? And what does this have to do with academics or skill? Even if it does, for all we know, Lily could have gotten extremely lazy in later life.

Also, if we are listing talents and achievements like this, lets take a look at Harry's resume:
1.Killed a Dark Lord who subjugated a whole country at the age of 17.
2.Youngest Head Auror in history.
3.Mastered a patronus charm in his third year and successfully used it against multiple dementors.
4.Winner of the Tri-Wizard tournament- defeated the best of the best to win, even though the competitors were all 3 years older than him.
5.Survived the killing curse twice
6.Trained a bunch of teenagers in DADA, most of whom participated in the Battle Of Hogwarts and went toe-to-toe with fully trained DEs.
7.Killed a thousand year old Basilisk when he was twelve
8.Received the Order of Merlin, First Class, when he was 17
9.Mastered Occlumency before his 18th birthday, a talent that only Snape and Dumbledore displayed in the entire order
10.Did I mention he beat a fucking Dark Lord when he was seventeen?

Fuck, when stated like this, Harry seems more talented than both Voldemort and Dumbledore put together. But since we are aware of the circumstances, we know better than to assume Harry to be the greatest wizard of all time.

Bottomline is, we don't know much of anything about Lily and James. It irks me when many people assume that they were both prodigies and Harry could have barely stood in their shadows. In my head, Harry beats both James and Lily at the same time in a duel, and there is nothing in canon contradicting this.

 

Of course if you go looking around for ways to explain things away you'll find them. Anything can be explained away if you stretch credulity enough. But the balance of probabilities seems to lean heavily towards them being talented.

 

Fair enough. I still don't like most fans/fanfics implying that Lily and James were both highly talented prodigies while their son was a disappointing wimp, but I guess I will have to live with it. Regardless of academics, I find it highly unlikely from what evidence we have in canon that either of them could touch Harry in a duel anyway.

I guess I better stop before the mods start coming after me

 

Well James and lily were greater or equal to Sirius who could duel Bellatrix lest range while taunting and laughing, she was also Voldemorts General

S<L/J S=B B=G+Hr+L H=L+Hr/G

 

People's strengths and abilities can't be compared that easily, nor was Belletrix ever implied to be anything more than a particularly loyal, insane, and vicious bitch.


I would think James was implied to have above average skill just by virtue of having a rivalry with Snape, flat out the most skilled wizard in canon below Dumbledore/Voldemort. Between that, implied academic excellence, and being Head Boy (Bill, the other known holder, got 12 OWLs while Percy also received excellent marks, which at least suggests some academic skill is implied by the position) it seems like the case for James being skilled is stronger than the one saying he isn't.

 

The Snape thing was just 4-on-1 bullying, that's like implying Dudley was on the same level as Harry because he beat him up as a kid.

Still, I agree both James and Lily were probably better than average at academics- but Harry was better than average too so that's not saying much. Also, academic performance =/= dueling proficiency (as seen from Hermione in canon), and judging from their performance in the Godric's Hollow emergency situation, they didn't have much in fighting skills.

Anyway, in my personal head canon, Lily was Hermione-level good at academics, but crap at fighting, while James was a better dueler but Harry-level at academics. Also, Harry would easily slaughter them both in a fight. I just wish people would stop putting them on pedestals and make them (especially Lily) Mary Sues/Gary Stus in fanfics, while looking down at canon Harry as if he could never compare to their greatness.

 

Um what? Why are you upset?

 

Presumably because this is questions that don't deserve their own thread, yet it has been turned into discussion, to the extent of multi paragraph debate posts. I personally think an organic discussion is okay, but it is possible, if I have judged his reason for being upset correctly, that he does not.
Or I could be wrong.

 

You know what canon means, right?

 

I guess it would depend on the person' posting. One persons generic question is more important to others. When someone asks a question others see lots of different answers. The real answer I see is that it's just a story but others see it as a massive debate. personally I think is pointless to get annoyed no one will back off anyway.

 

Where do people think goblin names come from? The names don't seem like the names that a parent would give a child, rather they sound like names given for skills or personal abilities. Does anyone else suspect goblins 'earn' their names?

Griphook for example is a cart operator and his most impressive skill (cough) is a strong grip? Ragnok who I presume works near Bill Weasley in robbing Egyptian Tombs has a name similar to Ragnarok so I assume he's considered dangerous or something.

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Looking at the HP wiki though it seems other names in canon don't follow this theme.