This may have been addressed already, but why doesn’t Harry suspect at this point that Quirrell is Voldemort, or at least working for Voldemort?
This is especially puzzling after we get to hear Harry’s thoughts on what happened to Hermione in 85.
Now, maybe I’m suffering from obvious-in-retrospect syndrome here, given that I did not realize Quirrell was Voldemort until V ernq Ryvrmre’f fvapr-ergenpgrq fgngrzrag gung Dhveeryy vf Ibyqrzbeg. But that was before the Stanford Prison Experiment arc. Relevant facts in that and the Taboo Tradeoffs arc:
Quirrell broke Bellatrix out of Azkaban
Voldemort is the only person in the world with an obvious motive for wanting to break Bellatrix out of Azkaban, and is who everyone else thinks is responsible
Quirrell uses at least one alternate identity, and Harry suspects him of having many more
Quirrell’s explanation of his motives for breaking Bellatrix out of Azkaban (she might know something useful, also a whim, see Ch. 60) aren’t terribly satisfying
During Hermione’s trial (Ch. 80), Harry thought that it “seemed horribly and uniquely plausible that the entity who’d Memory-Charmed Hermione was the very same mind that had—made use of—Bellatrix Black.”
In Ch. 85, we see Harry is taking the possibility that Quirrell was behind the plot against Hermione seriously.
What pieces of evidence doesn’t Harry have here? He doesn’t know about horcruxes so he can’t make the connection to Quirrell’s story about the Pioneer Plaque, and Hermione hasn’t (yet?) told Harry what she’s realized about what Quirrell did and why (Ch. 84). But Harry still has a lot of evidence.
The one thing that may be tripping Harry up—and was tripping me up until the moment I mentioned in rot13 above—is that Quirrell seems very serious about his “I don’t want to be a Dark Lord, I want you to be a Dark Lord, Harry!” line, and it’s hard to make sense of Voldemort taking that attitude.
Maybe Ridvolquir interpreted the prophecy as saying he can’t defeat Harry until Harry becomes a Dark Lord???
I think you’re missing the mundane explanation. Harry really likes Quirrell. He’s the person he most relates with in the world; he’s the person he looks up to; he’s the smart/strong/cool teacher Harry wants to be when he grows up.
Surely there were other people, maybe better people, to trust and befriend? Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, Hermione, Draco, not to mention Mum and Dad, it wasn’t like Harry was alone...
Only...
A choking sensation grew in Harry’s throat as he understood.
Only Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, Hermione, Draco, they all of them sometimes knew things that Harry didn’t, but...
They did not excel above Harry within his own sphere of power; such genius as they possessed was not like his genius, and his genius was not like theirs; he might look upon them as peers, but not look up to them as his superiors.
None of them had been, none of them could ever be...
Harry’s mentor...
That was who Professor Quirrell had been.
Any person, especially a child, will gladly ignore and forgive a million counter-indications as long as they really like the person.
Voldemort is the only person in the world with an obvious motive for wanting to break Bellatrix out of Azkaban, and is who everyone else thinks is responsible
What motive would Harry expect Voldemort to have? As far as I can recall, he doesn’t know about the components required for the spell to revive someone kept from death by horcruxes, and Bellatrix is not a very capable servant for the time being, and he doesn’t believe Voldemort cared about her in any case. Quirrell, on the other hand, has already claimed a selfish motive that he personally has for freeing Bellatrix that would not apply to Voldemort.
Keep in mind that for Harry, the potential hypothesis space is huge. Quirrell might secretly be Rudolph Wizencamp in disguise. Don’t know who Rudolph Wizencamp is? Well, neither does Harry, he’s only lived in the wizarding world for a few months after all. We can reason by dramatic convention and conservation of detail, but for Harry, the list of all possibilities raised by the facts about the wizarding world that he’s aware of is far from exhaustive.
Dumbledore told Harry in the “Today your war has begun” speech that Bellatrix was one of three things Voldemort needed to return as strong as he was before.
The flesh of his servant, willingly given; the blood of his foe, forcibly taken; and the bone of his ancestor, unknowingly bequeathed. Voldemort is a perfectionist—” Albus glanced at Severus, who nodded agreement, “—and he would certainly seek the most powerful combination: the flesh of Bellatrix Black, the blood of Harry Potter, and the bone of his father.
Though personally I think Albus Dumbledore’s blood (if he could obtain it) and Salazar Slytherin’s bone (if he could find such) would be a more interesting combination; as it differs from canon in all three elements.
I have alarm bells going off in my head and I feel like I read something suggesting that Quirrell took Harry’s blood at some point in time. Or that Harry bled in his presence. Or something. This could be a fake memory though because it’s very vague.
Earlier in this very same chapter, Harry tells Quirrell that he can’t imagine Quirrell hurting someone unless he means to. (This was in context of their discussion of the Gryffindor who cast a dark curse without knowing what it did.)
So we can assume that either Quirrell isn’t as precise as Harry thinks and accidentally hurt Harry, or that he’s exactly as precise as Harry thinks and took the blood on purpose.
Snape tells Moody that the “bone of the father” has to be removed from the original grave during the ritual. It stands to reason that the other two components must be sacrificed during the ritual as well.
I couldn’t decide where to put it! Your post was kinda sorta a furtherance of chaosmosis’s point, and and it could have been a reply to ArisKatsaris below too, and and it was just so confusing!
But personally I doubt it has some deeper significance. Quirrel seemed honestly distracted by the article at that time—and a papercut doesn’t leave much if any blood on the paper… as the paper moves away fast enough that blood doesn’t even have time to flow on it.
I find “a papercut doesn’t leave much if any blood on the paper… as the paper moves away fast enough that blood doesn’t even have time to flow on it” way more convincing than “Quirrel seemed honestly distracted by the article at that time”.
a papercut doesn’t leave much if any blood on the paper… as the paper moves away fast enough that blood doesn’t even have time to flow on it.
It is possible to engineer, though, if you’re manipulating the paper with great telekinetic precision. I accidentally bloodstained a book that way when I was about Harry’s age.
Though it must be said that in canon, it didn’t take much. After cutting Harry’s arm with a dagger, “Wormtail, still panting with pain, rumbled in his pocket for a glass vial and held it to Harry’s cut, so that a dribble of blood fell into it.”
I also don’t remember anything specific about Harry bleeding in any chapter, but an opportunity to take it unawares would have been just before chapter 60, when Harry was sleeping in Quirrel’s presence.
A potential problem with Quirrel doing this is that the ritual’s requirements seem to distinguish between “forcibly” and “unknowingly”. It’s possible that he’ll have to do it by directly forcing Harry to give up his blood, not by deceiving or tricking him, or even letting him lie unconscious while he’s pulling it out.
I was referring to a question of objective fact, not a prediction or speculation. Saying that Harry bled in Quirrell’s presence in no way assumes that Harry is Voldemort’s foe. Your comment wasn’t relevant to mine.
Nitpick: You’re not wording it exactly right. In canon it said “bone of the father” and “blood of the enemy”—not “bone of the ancestor” nor “blood of sworn enemy”.
We can also remember that harry was asked by Lesath Lestrange, which gives you an obvious other option for someone who would want to break her out. Having a child who loves her is going to change his view of the evilness of breaking her out.
Maybe Ridvolquir interpreted the prophecy as saying he can’t defeat Harry until Harry becomes a Dark Lord???
For Harry to be the Dark Lord in the prophecy, and Voldemort the one with the power to defeat him, would require Voldemort to be born to those who thrice defied Harry. Taken literally the prophecy requires the one with the power to defeat the Dark Lord to be younger than him.
Quirrell’s explanation of his motives for breaking Bellatrix out of Azkaban (she might know something useful, also a whim, see Ch. 60) aren’t terribly satisfying
Yeah, they’re not satisfying to me either. If Bellatrix knew any rare and dangerous magic, I’d expect Dumbledore to have learned whatever he could from her by whatever means are within his moral restraints, and then Obliviated her to stop anyone else from doing the same thing. This puts some restraints on Quirrill’s magic usage, too: if he uses any magic that he taught to Bellatrix, Dumbledore will recognize it.
Yeah, though somehow I believe him. Though if RidVolQuir can lie well enough that I believe him, with all my extra knowledge, no wonder Harry is fooled.
Reasons for believing him, though, are:
The “don’t want to be a Dark Lord, not enough fun” rationale fits very well with what else we know about the HPMOR version of the character.
Shows other signs of being sincerely interested in teaching.
Was pissed off when Harry disagreed with his Yule speech, and apparently not just because Harry said so in public. Rather, he seems to really cares that Harry agree with him about it.
Has made a matter-of-fact prediction that Harry will become a Dark Lord, if he learns everything Quirrell has to teach. And he wasn’t trying to deter Harry from that path, which suggests Harry going in that direction (if not succeeding) is a part of his plans.
Was annoyed with Harry when Harry wouldn’t go along with his fake-defeat-of-Voldemort plan.
This quote: “I wish for Britain to grow strong under a strong leader; that is my desire. As for my reasons why,” Professor Quirrell smiled without mirth, “I think they shall stay my own.” Given Quirrell’s Yule speech, the first part is pretty clearly true, and the second part is consistent with a plot with a component (Harry becoming Dark Lord) that in principle can’t be concealed from Harry, but whose end result isn’t in Harry’s best interest.
Note: I’ve suspected Quirrellmort was sincere about the “help Harry become Dark Lord” thing for a long time, but I recently re-read Chs. 60-66, which greatly increased my confidence about that.
Was pissed off when Harry disagreed with his Yule speech, and apparently not just because Harry said so in public. Rather, he seems to really cares that Harry agree with him about it.
I think the Yule speech was largely to set up the wizarding world to take Harry as their Dear Leader. Having Harry argue against it was not what Quirrell had in mind.
Quirrell:
It should have been obvious even to you that you should have stayed silent, and consulted with me first, not spoken your worries before the crowd!”
I think he wants Harry to be the Dark Lord too, so that in the end he can take over his body like Quirrell’s and rule as Dark Lord Harry, when Harry seems to defeat Voldemort.
This post helps a lot. I knew that all the evidence for Quirrell = Voldemort was insurmountable, but I was uneasy with the conclusions everyone seemed to be drawing for it. I realize that this was because I was viewing RidVolQuir as evil, like canon Voldemort, rather than as the unique agent he is. I agree with your analysis, although I think RidVolQuir will turn sinister soon enough (unless Snape does something soon?).
One thing that your analysis can’t explain very well: Quirrell’s involvement with the plot to get Harry’s friends.
Maybe it was Snape who planned the plot. Snape’s motives are a complete unknown right now, but clearly important. But Quirrell still warned Hermione to leave which seems like evidence against Snape being the culprit. Only now I realize that telling Hermione to leave is what a good and sane teacher with concern for her well being would do. So that would resolve this fairly well.
Sorry for the stream of consciousness style of this comment.
When I said “one thing that [his] analysis can’t explain very well: Quirrell’s involvement with the plot to get Harry’s friends” I was falsely thinking that only wholly evil motivations could motivate that plot. But it could have easily been for some distorted and twisted version of the greater good.
I don’t like the idea of RidVolQuir being wholly evil, such beings are improbable. I initially hoped for and thought I would receive a sympathetic Voldemort. Unfortunately I no longer think that’s going to happen because I think that the post dementor attack Harry evil mode which wanted to kill everyone is meant to be evidence that Harry is Voldemort’s Horcrux, which would also indicate that Voldemort’s soul is inherently and totally evil. I don’t like that idea and hope my prediction is wrong.
The grandparent of this comment made me feel a little better about the odds of a not-totally-evil Voldemort, but not very much better. Now that I think about it though, since RidVolQuir has thus far been portrayed in such a way that allows the reader to sympathize with him, maybe even a Voldemort with the automatic killing response would still somehow manage to be less boring and more realistic than I anticipate. That seems like it would be tough to pull off though.
One thing that’s been really puzzling me since re-reading TSPE—why exactly DID Quirrell break Bellatrix out? If it’s to do the resurrection spell (as in canon) then why not take Harry’s blood right after the prison break, and just resurrect already? (Further, it assumes that Voldemort’s body was dead in the first place and needed resurrecting, which we can’t assume because Godric’s Hollow looks like a set-up.)
But Quirrell’s own claimed motive (to learn some of Salazar Slytherin’s secrets) is even dodgier. If Quirrell actually is Voldemort, then he knows those secrets anyway. (Or does he? If he died, them perhaps his Horcrux memory doesn’t count as a living mind within the smallprint of the edict of Merlin).
This may have been addressed already, but why doesn’t Harry suspect at this point that Quirrell is Voldemort, or at least working for Voldemort?
This is especially puzzling after we get to hear Harry’s thoughts on what happened to Hermione in 85.
Now, maybe I’m suffering from obvious-in-retrospect syndrome here, given that I did not realize Quirrell was Voldemort until V ernq Ryvrmre’f fvapr-ergenpgrq fgngrzrag gung Dhveeryy vf Ibyqrzbeg. But that was before the Stanford Prison Experiment arc. Relevant facts in that and the Taboo Tradeoffs arc:
Quirrell broke Bellatrix out of Azkaban
Voldemort is the only person in the world with an obvious motive for wanting to break Bellatrix out of Azkaban, and is who everyone else thinks is responsible
Quirrell uses at least one alternate identity, and Harry suspects him of having many more
Quirrell’s explanation of his motives for breaking Bellatrix out of Azkaban (she might know something useful, also a whim, see Ch. 60) aren’t terribly satisfying
During Hermione’s trial (Ch. 80), Harry thought that it “seemed horribly and uniquely plausible that the entity who’d Memory-Charmed Hermione was the very same mind that had—made use of—Bellatrix Black.”
In Ch. 85, we see Harry is taking the possibility that Quirrell was behind the plot against Hermione seriously.
What pieces of evidence doesn’t Harry have here? He doesn’t know about horcruxes so he can’t make the connection to Quirrell’s story about the Pioneer Plaque, and Hermione hasn’t (yet?) told Harry what she’s realized about what Quirrell did and why (Ch. 84). But Harry still has a lot of evidence.
The one thing that may be tripping Harry up—and was tripping me up until the moment I mentioned in rot13 above—is that Quirrell seems very serious about his “I don’t want to be a Dark Lord, I want you to be a Dark Lord, Harry!” line, and it’s hard to make sense of Voldemort taking that attitude.
Maybe Ridvolquir interpreted the prophecy as saying he can’t defeat Harry until Harry becomes a Dark Lord???
I think you’re missing the mundane explanation. Harry really likes Quirrell. He’s the person he most relates with in the world; he’s the person he looks up to; he’s the smart/strong/cool teacher Harry wants to be when he grows up.
Any person, especially a child, will gladly ignore and forgive a million counter-indications as long as they really like the person.
Regarding the initial sensation of doubt he had: I don’t remember ever figuring out what caused it.
Does anyone have any theories?
What motive would Harry expect Voldemort to have? As far as I can recall, he doesn’t know about the components required for the spell to revive someone kept from death by horcruxes, and Bellatrix is not a very capable servant for the time being, and he doesn’t believe Voldemort cared about her in any case. Quirrell, on the other hand, has already claimed a selfish motive that he personally has for freeing Bellatrix that would not apply to Voldemort.
Keep in mind that for Harry, the potential hypothesis space is huge. Quirrell might secretly be Rudolph Wizencamp in disguise. Don’t know who Rudolph Wizencamp is? Well, neither does Harry, he’s only lived in the wizarding world for a few months after all. We can reason by dramatic convention and conservation of detail, but for Harry, the list of all possibilities raised by the facts about the wizarding world that he’s aware of is far from exhaustive.
Dumbledore told Harry in the “Today your war has begun” speech that Bellatrix was one of three things Voldemort needed to return as strong as he was before.
What were the other two things?
See chapter 61:
Though personally I think Albus Dumbledore’s blood (if he could obtain it) and Salazar Slytherin’s bone (if he could find such) would be a more interesting combination; as it differs from canon in all three elements.
I have alarm bells going off in my head and I feel like I read something suggesting that Quirrell took Harry’s blood at some point in time. Or that Harry bled in his presence. Or something. This could be a fake memory though because it’s very vague.
Was it this bit?
Earlier in this very same chapter, Harry tells Quirrell that he can’t imagine Quirrell hurting someone unless he means to. (This was in context of their discussion of the Gryffindor who cast a dark curse without knowing what it did.)
So we can assume that either Quirrell isn’t as precise as Harry thinks and accidentally hurt Harry, or that he’s exactly as precise as Harry thinks and took the blood on purpose.
Snape tells Moody that the “bone of the father” has to be removed from the original grave during the ritual. It stands to reason that the other two components must be sacrificed during the ritual as well.
This is a good point. (Why is it a reply to me rather than chaosmosis?)
I couldn’t decide where to put it! Your post was kinda sorta a furtherance of chaosmosis’s point, and and it could have been a reply to ArisKatsaris below too, and and it was just so confusing!
Nice catch! Upvoted.
But personally I doubt it has some deeper significance. Quirrel seemed honestly distracted by the article at that time—and a papercut doesn’t leave much if any blood on the paper… as the paper moves away fast enough that blood doesn’t even have time to flow on it.
I find “a papercut doesn’t leave much if any blood on the paper… as the paper moves away fast enough that blood doesn’t even have time to flow on it” way more convincing than “Quirrel seemed honestly distracted by the article at that time”.
It is possible to engineer, though, if you’re manipulating the paper with great telekinetic precision. I accidentally bloodstained a book that way when I was about Harry’s age.
Though it must be said that in canon, it didn’t take much. After cutting Harry’s arm with a dagger, “Wormtail, still panting with pain, rumbled in his pocket for a glass vial and held it to Harry’s cut, so that a dribble of blood fell into it.”
That was it.
I also don’t remember anything specific about Harry bleeding in any chapter, but an opportunity to take it unawares would have been just before chapter 60, when Harry was sleeping in Quirrel’s presence.
A potential problem with Quirrel doing this is that the ritual’s requirements seem to distinguish between “forcibly” and “unknowingly”. It’s possible that he’ll have to do it by directly forcing Harry to give up his blood, not by deceiving or tricking him, or even letting him lie unconscious while he’s pulling it out.
Harry has also fallen asleep around Quirrel since then, in the warehouse after the prison break.
This assumes that Harry is V’s foe, not an obvious assumption in this fanfic.
I was referring to a question of objective fact, not a prediction or speculation. Saying that Harry bled in Quirrell’s presence in no way assumes that Harry is Voldemort’s foe. Your comment wasn’t relevant to mine.
Neg karma, anyone care to explain why?
Bone of ancestor, blood of sworn enemy (assuming Bellatrix will fulfil the ‘flesh of servant’ role; it seems very likely.)
That is how it went in canon, anyway, although Voldemort used Peter Pettigrew as the servant there.
Nitpick: You’re not wording it exactly right. In canon it said “bone of the father” and “blood of the enemy”—not “bone of the ancestor” nor “blood of sworn enemy”.
Right.
Good point about Bellatrix not being a very capable servant. Hmmm...
We can also remember that harry was asked by Lesath Lestrange, which gives you an obvious other option for someone who would want to break her out. Having a child who loves her is going to change his view of the evilness of breaking her out.
For Harry to be the Dark Lord in the prophecy, and Voldemort the one with the power to defeat him, would require Voldemort to be born to those who thrice defied Harry. Taken literally the prophecy requires the one with the power to defeat the Dark Lord to be younger than him.
Yeah, they’re not satisfying to me either. If Bellatrix knew any rare and dangerous magic, I’d expect Dumbledore to have learned whatever he could from her by whatever means are within his moral restraints, and then Obliviated her to stop anyone else from doing the same thing. This puts some restraints on Quirrill’s magic usage, too: if he uses any magic that he taught to Bellatrix, Dumbledore will recognize it.
I think that was a hypothetical alternate interpretation of “and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal”, actually.
Yes, that was my intent. The thought is that Voldemort thinks that by helping Harry become a Dark Lord, he can fulfill that part of the prophecy.
Or possibly he is lying.
Yeah, though somehow I believe him. Though if RidVolQuir can lie well enough that I believe him, with all my extra knowledge, no wonder Harry is fooled.
Reasons for believing him, though, are:
The “don’t want to be a Dark Lord, not enough fun” rationale fits very well with what else we know about the HPMOR version of the character.
Shows other signs of being sincerely interested in teaching.
Was pissed off when Harry disagreed with his Yule speech, and apparently not just because Harry said so in public. Rather, he seems to really cares that Harry agree with him about it.
Has made a matter-of-fact prediction that Harry will become a Dark Lord, if he learns everything Quirrell has to teach. And he wasn’t trying to deter Harry from that path, which suggests Harry going in that direction (if not succeeding) is a part of his plans.
Was annoyed with Harry when Harry wouldn’t go along with his fake-defeat-of-Voldemort plan.
This quote: “I wish for Britain to grow strong under a strong leader; that is my desire. As for my reasons why,” Professor Quirrell smiled without mirth, “I think they shall stay my own.” Given Quirrell’s Yule speech, the first part is pretty clearly true, and the second part is consistent with a plot with a component (Harry becoming Dark Lord) that in principle can’t be concealed from Harry, but whose end result isn’t in Harry’s best interest.
Note: I’ve suspected Quirrellmort was sincere about the “help Harry become Dark Lord” thing for a long time, but I recently re-read Chs. 60-66, which greatly increased my confidence about that.
I think the Yule speech was largely to set up the wizarding world to take Harry as their Dear Leader. Having Harry argue against it was not what Quirrell had in mind.
Quirrell:
I think he wants Harry to be the Dark Lord too, so that in the end he can take over his body like Quirrell’s and rule as Dark Lord Harry, when Harry seems to defeat Voldemort.
And yet he played the role of Dark Lord for many years, even after he quit his Savior persona because that wasn’t fun enough.
This post helps a lot. I knew that all the evidence for Quirrell = Voldemort was insurmountable, but I was uneasy with the conclusions everyone seemed to be drawing for it. I realize that this was because I was viewing RidVolQuir as evil, like canon Voldemort, rather than as the unique agent he is. I agree with your analysis, although I think RidVolQuir will turn sinister soon enough (unless Snape does something soon?).
One thing that your analysis can’t explain very well: Quirrell’s involvement with the plot to get Harry’s friends.
Maybe it was Snape who planned the plot. Snape’s motives are a complete unknown right now, but clearly important. But Quirrell still warned Hermione to leave which seems like evidence against Snape being the culprit. Only now I realize that telling Hermione to leave is what a good and sane teacher with concern for her well being would do. So that would resolve this fairly well.
Sorry for the stream of consciousness style of this comment.
The standard explanation is that they were a good influence on him. In chaper 66 Harry tells Quirrell that after the Azkaban debacle:
When I said “one thing that [his] analysis can’t explain very well: Quirrell’s involvement with the plot to get Harry’s friends” I was falsely thinking that only wholly evil motivations could motivate that plot. But it could have easily been for some distorted and twisted version of the greater good.
I don’t like the idea of RidVolQuir being wholly evil, such beings are improbable. I initially hoped for and thought I would receive a sympathetic Voldemort. Unfortunately I no longer think that’s going to happen because I think that the post dementor attack Harry evil mode which wanted to kill everyone is meant to be evidence that Harry is Voldemort’s Horcrux, which would also indicate that Voldemort’s soul is inherently and totally evil. I don’t like that idea and hope my prediction is wrong.
The grandparent of this comment made me feel a little better about the odds of a not-totally-evil Voldemort, but not very much better. Now that I think about it though, since RidVolQuir has thus far been portrayed in such a way that allows the reader to sympathize with him, maybe even a Voldemort with the automatic killing response would still somehow manage to be less boring and more realistic than I anticipate. That seems like it would be tough to pull off though.
One thing that’s been really puzzling me since re-reading TSPE—why exactly DID Quirrell break Bellatrix out? If it’s to do the resurrection spell (as in canon) then why not take Harry’s blood right after the prison break, and just resurrect already? (Further, it assumes that Voldemort’s body was dead in the first place and needed resurrecting, which we can’t assume because Godric’s Hollow looks like a set-up.)
But Quirrell’s own claimed motive (to learn some of Salazar Slytherin’s secrets) is even dodgier. If Quirrell actually is Voldemort, then he knows those secrets anyway. (Or does he? If he died, them perhaps his Horcrux memory doesn’t count as a living mind within the smallprint of the edict of Merlin).
So I observe that I am confused.