Why did Dumbledore offer Licorice Snaps to Harry in GoF?

Why did Dumbledore offer Licorice Snaps to Harry in GoF? - Crop businessman giving contract to woman to sign

In Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry discovered that the 3rd man in his dream was Barty Crouch Jr after he saw one of (Dumbledore's) preserved memories in the Pensieve. Also, it was only after this that Dumbledore gets a strong hint that there is now another man active in Voldemort's team and that is Barty Crouch Jr. All that couldn't have happened if Harry hadn't accidentally knocked the doors of the Pensieve area to open after being attacked by the Licorice Snaps offered to him by Dumbledore.

Now, considering that Dumbledore is a man who would never say or do a thing without meaning or purpose, is it possible that he knew something significant would happen if Harry held some Licorice Snaps in his hand and that's why he offered Harry to try some of those?



Best Answer

After a lot of research online to find an answer, I have a theory for this now - The intention of making Dumbledore offer these magical, strange, semi-sentient, toothed sweets to Harry is nothing but to show the humorous side of Dumbledore's character. The film-makers have done this at a few places in the entire series and sometimes (like in this scene) they have even added something which is not in the book itself.

This theory is a combination of 2 main points:

1) The scene happens differently in the book. (Supporting link - http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/features/essays/issue4/pensievethoughts/). And,

2) The film-makers (especially post Chamber of Secrets) have tried to put a little emphasis on the humorous aspect of the Dumbledore's character as evident from one of the online sources (Supporting link - https://www.academia.edu/810353/Lost_in_Translation_Harry_Potter_from_Page_to_Screen). Relevant excerpt is as follows:

A ?lm can, however, aspire to translate what the adapters—foremost, the director, but also the screenwriter—perceive as the novel’s core experience. Central to Dumbledore’s character is a balance between seriousness and humor. As Steve Kloves puts it, “Dumbledore bears such a tremendous dark burden ... and the only way that he can keep that at bay, the darkness, is to be whimsical and humorous.” Newell can omit Dumbledore’s wry remark about Aberforth because, as Cuarón’s ?lm does, Newell’s provides many examples of the headmaster’s sense of humor, restoring this aspect of his personality after its near-absence from the ?rst two movies. In one moment not in the novel, the fourth ?lm has Dumbledore telling Harry that “the licorice snaps are a wee bit sharp” (as Harry discovers, they snap at your ?ngers if you don’t eat them promptly). When visiting Harry in his dormitory near the movie’s end, Dumbledore observes, “I never liked these curtains. Set them on ?re in my fourth year—by accident, of course.”




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Why did the licorice bite Harry Potter?

Albus Dumbledore kept a bowl of these sweets in his office and offered some to Harry Potter in 1995, warning that they were "a wee bit sharp." Harry helped himself to a great handful, resulting in the sweets biting his hand.

Why did Dumbledore show Harry the Pensieve?

The Pensieve of Hogwarts was a magical instrument used by the Headteachers to view memories. Professor Albus Dumbledore used it to review particular memories of Tom Riddle, among other things, and to give Harry Potter private lessons during the 1996\u20131997 school year.




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