" Maybe you didn't have the right books. Not many libraries can answer every request. But there are books you could have used-- stories from commanders and fighting men, and more-- the maps alone! But there are maps--were maps, will be-- in both our times. Books on planning and campaigns and tactics, too."
He looks at Harry thoughtfully. "And you didn't get to read them. Somehow, in your own castle or by the decisions of men possibly nations away, someone decided you wouldn't get to know. That you didn't have the right even to choose ignorance, that you couldn't be trusted to do your part if you had that bit of knowledge."
Sorry, Harry, you've got him on a tear now. "And you may ask how I know that, and I know that because I read it; the words of censors and the stories of men who chose what books went where, long before I was born. And what my teachers told me, too, some of them; read this, don't read that, you're not soul enough to stand against it!!Hah, and they'd prate on about the soul needing to learn strength, and then swear it couldn't handle a few stray bits of ink!"
But while he's on a tear, he hasn't lost sight of what prompted it. "--So you see I did learn to fight from study, and for study. How to see the fight being set up, and sometimes how to get out of a fight I hadn't chosen; that, first. And more." He smiles and flips a book out of the stack he's accumulated, and holds it out to Harry. It's a slim little thing, with the title Defense Against the Dark Dead: Combat Against The Superhuman. "And then there's the direct lessons, of course."
no subject
He looks at Harry thoughtfully. "And you didn't get to read them. Somehow, in your own castle or by the decisions of men possibly nations away, someone decided you wouldn't get to know. That you didn't have the right even to choose ignorance, that you couldn't be trusted to do your part if you had that bit of knowledge."
Sorry, Harry, you've got him on a tear now. "And you may ask how I know that, and I know that because I read it; the words of censors and the stories of men who chose what books went where, long before I was born. And what my teachers told me, too, some of them; read this, don't read that, you're not soul enough to stand against it!!Hah, and they'd prate on about the soul needing to learn strength, and then swear it couldn't handle a few stray bits of ink!"
But while he's on a tear, he hasn't lost sight of what prompted it. "--So you see I did learn to fight from study, and for study. How to see the fight being set up, and sometimes how to get out of a fight I hadn't chosen; that, first. And more." He smiles and flips a book out of the stack he's accumulated, and holds it out to Harry. It's a slim little thing, with the title Defense Against the Dark Dead: Combat Against The Superhuman. "And then there's the direct lessons, of course."