chapter thirteen of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Harry finds a discarded diary, and after a forgettable Valentine’s day (where he receives a very public valentine), he writes in the diary – and it writes back. Soon he is inside, and Tom Riddle is showing him that Hagrid was expelled fifty years ago for opening the Chamber of Secrets.
 

“Happy Valentine’s Day!” Lockhart shouted. “And may I thank the forty-six people who have so far sent me cards!”

(by Vizen)

 

Ron was having trouble with his wand again; large purple bubbles were blossoming out of the end, and he wasn’t much interested in anything else.

(by Tealin Raintree)

 

Harry would have given all the gold in Gringotts to evaporate on the spot.

(by gerre)

 

“I can show you, if you like,” came Riddle’s reply. “You don’t have to take my word for it. I can take you inside my memory of the night when I caught him.”

(by TomScribble)

 

A boy of about sixteen entered, taking off his pointed hat. A silver prefect’s badge was glinting on his chest…. “Ah, Riddle,” said the headmaster.

(by Laurence Peguy)

 

“It was Hagrid, Ron. Hagrid opened the Chamber of Secrets fifty years ago.”

(by Laurence Peguy)

 

about the chapter

Something You May Not Have Noticed

When Riddle was hiding waiting for Hagrid, he didn’t pick a classroom at random – he hid in the Potions classroom, where we’ll learn years later he was probably pretty assured of safety if he was caught. After all, he was very close to the school’s Potions professor at the time, and the professor certainly wouldn’t have suspected him of any ill will.
 

Life at Hogwarts

Armando Dippet – the headmaster preceding Dumbledore, who Harry sees in Tom Riddle’s memory – doesn’t seem quite as sharp as Dumbledore. He may have been an excellent Headmaster, we don’t know; but every time Harry visits Dumbledore he feels as though Dumbledore is seeing right through into his inner thoughts and intentions, and he’s already said that Dumbledore seems to pretty much know everything that goes on in the school. In Dippet’s case, however, he seems to quickly and easily buy a lame excuse of Riddle’s that Harry sees right through, and readily admits he has no idea of the source of the attacks. After which Riddle runs into Dumbledore in the hallway, where Dumbledore gives him “exactly the kind of penetrating stare” Harry is used to. I wonder how differently the school was run under Dippet’s leadership than it is today.
 

The Boy Who Lived

It’s never confirmed in the books, but J.K. Rowling later said in an interview that Harry’s Valentine was indeed sent by Ginny Weasley, “of her own volition.” Judging by the references we’ve seen to her thus far (deeply shaken by the attacks, desperate to attract Harry’s attention, getting sick and needing Pepperup Potion, Fred and George torturing her into having nightmares, etc.), the poor girl is having a very rough first year at Hogwarts.
 

Something to Remember

Harry seems to have a very strange, inexplicable attachment to T.M. Riddle’s diary, and it’s particularly interesting that the name perks his interest in the way it does – “almost as though Riddle was a friend he’d had when he was very small, and had half-forgotten.” Even when Harry learns more about the diary, this bizarre attachment won’t be explained. But he’ll find out one day why it exists.