CS4: At Flourish and Blotts

"*Together you and I are worth the front page.*"
— Gilderoy Lockhart

Harry and the Weasleys receive their required book lists from Hogwarts and go to Diagon Alley. There Harry arrives in Knockturn Alley, overhears the Malfoys, is found by Hagrid and meets author/teacher Gilderoy Lockhart before Arthur Weasley comes to blows with Lucius Malfoy.

## Calendar and Dates

The main action of this chapter occurs on the August Wednesday on which the Weasleys and Harry visit Diagon Alley.

## Interesting Facts and Notes

As hinted at by the chapter title, the main event of this chapter takes place at Flourish and Blotts: Lucius Malfoy planting Tom Riddle's Diary among Ginny's schoolbooks. Lockhart's grandstanding serves primarily as a contrast to Harry's attitude toward his own rather more substantial claim to fame, while the fistfight between Lucius and Arthur is only one (rather dramatic) demonstration of their very different attitudes toward Muggles.

This chapter marks the first appearance of Lucius Malfoy, as well as our first glimpse of Knockturn Alley and Harry's first encounter with the Floo Network.

**Life at the Burrow was as different as possible from life in Privet Drive. The Dursleys liked everything neat and ordered; the Weasleys' house burst with the strange and unexpected.**

Harry isn't the only witness to the Dursleys' overly fussy, rigid approach to neatness. Tonks will observe three years later that the Dursleys' place is "a bit too clean" (OP3).

Neatness, per se, isn't represented as a bad thing in the Harry Potter universe; when reasonably satisfied with their situations, for example, house-elves (such as most of those on staff at Hogwarts, and Winky before her dismissal from the Crouch household) are uncommonly tidy, while unhappy house-elves may do their work neatly but no not keep themselves tidy. Hermione is devoted to organisation - even in her first year, she colour-coded her notes and drew up study schedules - but that serves a purpose in her case.

The kind of neatness practiced at the Dursleys', though, is sterile and rather pointless (also note observations in OP2 about Petunia's "surgically clean kitchen"). The Dursleys mainly seem interested in conforming to normalcy, rather than, say, just keeping the house organised to make life comfortable for the inhabitants. Petunia keeps a very clean house, but is never mentioned as having other interests apart from spying on the neighbours and fussing over her son. Even then, as observed by Harry in GF2, Petunia is quick enough to spot fingerprints on her gleaming walls, but fails to see some very obvious, important things.

**The mirror that shouted at Harry**

Harry encounters another talking mirror in his room at the Leaky Cauldron a year later (PA4). That mirror, like this one, seems to have a bit of a snarky attitude.

**small explosions from Fred and George's bedroom were considered perfectly normal**

Fred and George are undoubtedly breaking the ban on underage magic here. Molly and Arthur have apparently given up trying to keep their children from using a little magic now and then. After all, magic is completely infused into life at the Burrow. Small explosions, though? The twins are pushing the boundaries a little. No wonder Molly loses her temper with them at the beginning of the fourth book when she discovers that they're trying to sell their inventions (GF6).

**Harry talked him through using a telephone**

Arthur apparently teaches the rest of the family this Muggle skill. The next summer, Ron gives the "fellytone" a try and calls Harry in Privet Drive. However, he shouts so loudly that Vernon is incensed. Then Ron identifies himself as a member of the magical community, whereupon Vernon hangs up on him. Even Molly learns to use the phone, however, because a year later she "brave(s) the telephone in the village Post Office" to order taxis to take them to King's Cross.

***The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 2* by Miranda Goshawk**

This book series follows the students through their years at Hogwarts. Grades 1 through 6 are specifically mentioned; presumably there is a Grade 7 book as well, but since Harry didn't go to Hogwarts in his seventh year, we don't know for sure.

**An unexpected expense**

Typically, students only have to buy a few more books each year after their first. Books such as *One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi* serves them for each year of Herbology and probably as a standard reference guide for adults too. Go George is quite surprised when he sees a long list of books for each of them to buy.

Hopefully, for Molly's sake, Ginny will be able to use a family copy of *The Standard Book of Spells (Grade One)*, since Ron will be using the *Grade Two* book this year.

**Harry is surprised that Ginny is starting Hogwarts**

Poor Ginny. Harry hasn't even paid enough attention to her to realise that she's about to start Hogwarts. Certainly she would have been talking about it... except of course she doesn't talk around him. Remember that we are seeing Ginny entirely through Harry's eyes right now, which basically means that we're not seeing her at all.

**Hermione suggests that they meet her and Flick in Diagon Alley the following Wednesday**

So it wasn't until this point that plans were made to go to Diagon Alley. Somehow, Lucius found out about it, assuming that his plan all along involved passing the diary off on one of the Weasley children. The most likely explanation is that Dobby was still around, spying on Harry and reporting back to Lucius.

**Fives minutes later they were marching up the hill, broomsticks over their shoulders. They had asked Percy if he wanted to join them, but he had said he was busy.**

From this, we gather that Percy can play Quidditch if he wants to, although we don't know what position (if any) he prefers to play. Also, we can see that Percy's brothers are trying to be friendly with him, but he's too preoccupied to be interested in family Quidditch games.

The boys don't seem to have thought to ask Ginny if she wanted to play, unfortunately. How they underestimate that girl...

**"He's not himself. His exam results came the day before you did; twelve O.W.L.s and he hardly gloated at all."**

Several pieces of information can be worked out of this remark.

Percy can ordinarily be expected to gloat over an achievement (compare his lack of response over his O.W.L.s with his making sure everyone knew he'd been selected as a Gryffindor Prefect the previous year, or with his laying stress on his Head Boy status the next year), but he's preoccupied with something else this summer. As Ginny reveals onboard the Hogwarts Express in C18, Percy now has a girlfriend, Penelope Clearwater, and has been writing to her.

Two of the Weasleys, in fact, are not behaving like themselves this summer - Ginny and Percy - and until the visit to Flourish and Blotts, it's for the same reason, although the reason is an open secret in Ginny's case while being hidden in Percy's: each has developed a romantic attachment to someone else. In Ginny's case, of course, she has become very taken with Harry, which is later used to distract the reader from her diary-influenced activities. In a nice piece of symmetry, though, Percy's obviously suspicious behaviour is covering up the fact that he's courting Penelope Clearwater. Notice that throughout the book Percy is dragged across the readers' path as a red herring when diary-related activity crops up.

On another note, the O.W.L. results in 1992 were reported back to the students on 3 August, not in July, so it appears that the time of delivery varies from year to year. It's implied that twelve is an unusually high number of O.W.L.s.

**Five sets of Lockhart books**

Why five sets? Surely they can share these books, can't they? The Weasley kids will all be in Gryffindor so it shouldn't be too hard to make do with one or two sets, especially since I suspect that at least three of them seldom (if ever) read their textbooks. Lockhart is certainly raking in the royalties for all the copies of his books being sold to Hogwarts students this year.

**"And keep your elbows tucked in," Ron advised.**

**"And your eyes shut," said Mrs Weasley. "The soot-"**

**"Don't fidget," said Ron. "Or you might well fall out of the wrong fireplace-"**

**"But don't panic and get out too early, wait until you see Fred and George."**

This series of instructions explains one of the minor conundrums which fans have debated: how did slightly mispronouncing the words "Diagon Alley" send Harry to "Knockturn Alley" when they don't sound at all alike. The film version gets it wrong and compounds the misunderstanding.

Notice what actually happens to Harry:

> "*It felt as though he was being sucked down a giant drain. He seemed to be spinning very fast - the roaring in his ears was deafening - he tried to keep his eyes open but the whirl of green flames made him feel sick - something hard knocked his elbow and he tucked it in tightly, still spinning and spinning - now it felt as though cold hands were slapping his face - squinting through his glasses he saw a blurred stream of fireplaces and snatched glimpses of the rooms beyond - his bacon sandwiches were churning inside him - he closed his eyes again wishing it would stop, and then he fell, face forward, onto cold stone and felt the bridge of his glasses snap.*"
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We see here that Harry's problem isn't that he mispronounces the name but that he doesn't watch and make sure he's getting out of the right fireplace as he was instructed to. He actually has his eyes closed just before he arrives and then just falls forward, missing his destination by one grate.

**Arrival in Knockturn Alley**

Harry comes face to face here with a new and sinister part of the Wizarding world. His viewpoint expands once again.

**Harry climbs inside 'a large black cabinet' and steps inside, but leaves 'a small crack to peer through'**

This is very likely the Vanishing Cabinet which figures so prominently in book six. If so, Harry is very lucky that he didn't close the door all the way or he might have found himself unexpectedly transported somewhere else.

**Draco complains to his father, who has promised to buy him a racing broom, about Harry being allowed on the Gryffindor team**

Lucius seems to pay little attention to Draco's whining, but at some point in the next few weeks, he buys racing brooms not only for Draco but for the entire Slytherin Quidditch team.

**Lucius advises Draco to at least appear to be friendly with Harry**

He says this is because Harry is well-regarded in the Wizarding community, but it could also be because Lucius and the other Death Eaters are still wondering if Harry could actually be the next Dark Lord.

**The Hand of Glory**

Draco does eventually purchase the Hand of Glory and uses it in book six. The artefact allows him to see his way through the darkness created by Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder.

**"I am in something of a hurry, Borgin, I have important business elsewhere today-"**

Lucius is intent on setting his plot into motion by somehow passing the diary along to Harry or one of the Weasleys.

**Cursed opal necklace**

Here we have another of the Dark items which turn up in book six, used by Draco in his plot to kill Dumbledore.

**Borgin and Burkes**

The name "Burke" has two possible sources. William Burke was a famous murderer and grave robber in Scotland in the early 1800s, and from that the phrase "to burke" has come to mean "to smother someone to death." Alternately, the British slang term "berk" means an idiot or objectionable person. Sirius Black refers to himself and James as "arrogant little berks" when they were at Hogwarts together (OP29).

We will visit this shop again in book six, when Draco collects Dark items for his plans to kill Dumbledore. The history of his disreputable establishment, particularly the connection to Voldemort, becomes clear in that book as well.

In HBP we will also meet Caractacus Burke, one of the founders of the shop, because Dumbledore interviewed him while researching Tom Riddle's past.

**Knockturn Alley**

Similar to the name "Diagon Alley," "Knockturn Alley" is a play on the word "nocturnally," which is fitting for a place specialising in the Dark Arts.

**Entering Diagon Alley and seeing Gringotts**

This suggests that Knockturn Alley connects to Diagon Alley near Gringotts. On the other hand, Gringotts is the largest building in the Alley so it's likely to see even from some distance away.

**Mr. Weasley fixes Harry's glasses**

This is a *Reparo* spell, cast nonverbally by Arthur. Oddly, in the first film, it's Hermione who casts this spell aboard the Hogwarts Express before arriving at Hogwarts for the first time. The books don't give her that kind of skill at this age, instead allowing her and the other kids to progress in their abilities at a more logical pace.

**"Leave him alone, he didn't want all that!"**

Ginny's first words in front of Harry are to tell off Draco Malfoy. Although Harry doesn't notice it, we're seeing a little bit of Ginny's spitfire personality coming through. Technically, she's spoken around Harry before, in King's Cross at the beginning of school the year before. But since she didn't know at that point he was Harry Potter, it doesn't quite count.

**"Bet you're surprised to see Harry here, eh?"**

Why does Ron say this? Because he's assuming that Draco ordered Dobby to scare Harry away from Hogwarts. Draco doesn't seem to notice, though, and our suspicions are left in place.

**After the fight, Lucius is still holding Ginny's book**

This must be when he slips the diary into the book, just before he hands it back to Ginny. Clearly this encounter hasn't gone the way Lucius assumed it would. Is this plan B now, considering that the fight has tipped over the cauldron and thrown Lucius' plans awry? Has he decided that the closest he's going to get to Harry is to give the diary to Harry's 'girlfriend'?

## Exceptional Character Moments

* Mr Borgin, speaking his mind once Lucius Malfoy is out of earshot
* Lucius Malfoy, who seems a far cry from the kind of father who could be bullied into giving Draco a racing broom (compare with Draco's remarks the previous year). To his credit, he's interested in seeing Draco improve his academic performance rather than, say, attempting to sabotage Hermione's to make Draco look better in comparison.

## Memorable Lines

> "*I've been really worried and if Harry is all right, will you please let me know at once, but perhaps it would be better if you used a different owl, because I think another delivery might finish your one off.*"
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> "*Oh, it's you," said Ron, looking at Malfoy as if he were something unpleasant on the sole of his shoe.*"
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