The Harry Potter World's Chamber of Unanswered Questions

Question 5

Question 5

Why couldn’t Harry see the Theastrals from the start if he saw Lily die?

I have had this question asked to me numerous times by my not-as-intense Potter friends. My answer to this question is that although Harry did see Lily die, he did not specifically remember it for many years as he really was too young to remember something at the forefront of his mind. We know he does remember lots of green light, but he only saw this when he focus on it for hours on end while being locked in his cupboard. We then see the dementors in Harry’s third year. Their sole purpose in life, see what I did there, is to bring forward the worst of people’s worst memories. At this point the worst memory Harry has is of his parents’ death, so the memory that was stored somewhere in his mind but not necessarily where he had access, so to speak. So he has this memory, but he was too little for it to sink in for him when he first witnessed it, then in third year, remember he only heard their voices, he didn’t see this scene until the seventh book. So besides that, we also have that their deaths had a strong impact on him of course, but because of his age when they died, he did not have a sense of lost, it was more a want for what could have been. I believe this is crucial to the witnessing of theastrals, the death that you witness must have a stronger effect on you. For example, Luna saw the theastrals after her mother died when Luna was nine; Luna had time to get to know her mother so she had a feeling of loss. Harry felt guilty for the death of Cedric because he had told Cedric to take the cup. When we look at the case of Lily and James, we don’t see the sense of loss in Harry as I mentioned. The very short, corner-cutting, answer to this complicated question, in my opinion is, there is much more to seeing theastrals then watching someone die, which is why Harry did not see them after witnessing Lily’s death.

Thank you so much my patient readers. I am so sorry for not updating in forever! I sprained my toe then slammed it in a car door and completely forgot that I had to update! As always, vote, comment, share with your friends, and tell me your ideas, thoughts, opinions, and theories! Also if you have a Harry Potter related question that you want me to answer please PM it to me and I will answer it!

Take it easy Hogwarts, it has been… totally awesome!

Ginny