Home        Forum        Games

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone Analysis

By Harleen

    Hello everyone. My name's Harleen and I will be writing 5 articles looking inside the Harry Potter books and picking up those little coincidences or references that the reader usually wouldn't notice or think relevant unless they've read the books more than one time. As some of you may know, J.K. Rowling has a style of twisting the plot with things right under our noses.
Take for example, Ron's faithful pet rat, Scabbers. In the world of Harry Potter and magic, almost nothing is what it seems and everything comes unexpected. This article is going to try to uncover some of these secrets.
    Many references have been made in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, which prove to be very important in later books. These include Sirius Black and his flying motorcycle as well as Mrs. Figg. However, in this article I will be focusing on Mrs. Arabella Figg. First of all, she was once married. What happened to her husband? Is it possible that he died while working in the Order? Perhaps she wants to avenge her husband and although she is a Squib, she is working in the Order to get back at her husband's murderers. This is unlikely though, because when Moody showed Harry the picture of the original Order of the Phoenix, he did not mention a Figg. Also there are numerous mentions of Arabella Figg, cabbages, and cats throughout the book and the series. Some of these include:

· Mrs. Figg's house smells like cabbages and cats. She makes Harry look at
pictures of all the cats she'd ever owned
· The Polyjuice Potion tastes like over-cooked cabbage.
· The Apocethary in Diagon Alley smells like rotten cabbages.
· Hagrid buys Flesh-Eating Slug Repellent citing that they are ruining the
school cabbages.
· The tent Mr. Weasley borrows from the old Warlock that he works with,
Perkins, smells like cats and is decorated in exactly the same style as Mrs.
Figg's house.
· Mrs. Figg's cats, Tiddles, Mr. Paws, Snowy, and Tufty, could be spies for her to watch out for Harry. Another likely theory is that her cats are really Kneazles and are highly loyal to Mrs. Figg and are constantly watching out for Harry on behalf of her.
    These theories might be completely wrong, however, by reading the Harry Potter books, nothing is what they seem.