The Thing That Doesn't Make Sense About The Dursleys In Harry Potter
By Daniel Kim
Petunia Dursley (née Evans) had a difficult relationship with her sister Lily due to the fact that Petunia had no magical powers and Lily was a talented witch. (Both their parents were Muggles — humans with no magical abilities.) Given the rift that grew between the sister's over Lily's magical talents, it makes sense that Petunia, who secretly always wanted to be a witch, would resent her young nephew — whom Lily had with pure-blood wizard James Potter. Vernon, who hated anything odd or abnormal, clearly fell in line with his wife, viewing Harry as a freak. As for Dudley? Well, he was just an enormous brat and bully.
With all that said, though, the fact that the Dursleys made Harry sleep in a cupboard under the stairs doesn't really make sense.
After Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) murdered Lily and James Potter on October 31, 1981 and attempted to kill Harry as well but was unsuccessful, Rubeus Hagrid (Robbie Coltrane) rescued baby Harry and delivered him to the Dursley home at 4 Privet Drive on November 1, 1981. At that time, Harry was only a little over a year old (he was born on July 31, 1980). Even if the Dursleys didn't actively hate Harry and everything he represented, for pure convenience's sake, no sane person would keep an infant in a cupboard since it would mean running to the cupboard every time the baby needed to be fed or changed. And even if the Dursleys thought that the helpless infant Harry deserved such punishment, weren't they also punishing themselves, in a way, by having to duck into the dusty closet to change, feed, and dress him?
If we assume that the Dursleys didn't immediately put baby Harry into the cupboard under the stairs, when exactly did they move him there, and what was their reasoning for doing so? If guests came over for dinner, did they force Harry to hide in the cupboard to avoid uncomfortable questions? Hating Harry is one thing, but making him sleep in a spider-filled closet seems like a pretty extreme thing to do to a small child. By the time we meet Harry, he has been sleeping in the cupboard for "many years," leading readers and viewers to wonder exactly when he moved there at the Dursley family's behest in the first place.
