Doctor Cornelius

Expectations for Book 7

2007-07-18T23:02:27Z

Am typing this from a "Laptop Lane" PC in the Philadelphia airport on the way out of the country. Drafted the first few paragraphs yesterday; we'll see how much I can write in the 30 minutes I signed up to rent on the computer here.

**************

“Deathly Hallows” is a tough book to say very much interesting about in advance. There are some things about it that we know quite well (Harry, with Ron and Hermione, will spend the year going after Horcruxes before Harry’s final smackdown with Voldemort), or at least very probably (that R.A.B. was Regulus, and the “heavy locket they couldn’t open” was a Horcrux), so that there’s not too much to add there. There are some things that JKR has hinted about (the Flying Ford Anglia coming back, the business with the Invisibility Cloak when James and Lily died, the importance of Harry having his mother’s eyes) which sound interesting, but about which I can’t even think of any interesting speculations. And there are also some speculative possibilities which would be very cool if JKR used them, but which there’s no particular reason to think she’ll actually use (Tonks teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts, the Mirror of Erised coming back one last time, Luna’s Patronus taking the form of a Crumple-Horned Snorkack).

But I have tried to think of at least a few interesting things that I can say, which will hopefully be at least a little bit more relevant than the Crumple-Horned Patronus idea:

1. The General Tone of the Book (see my pre-HBP post on a similar topic here): am expecting DH to be the best of the series, surpassing PoA. To do this would probably take a PoA-caliber flurry of revelations in the final sequence, followed by a Gollum-on-Mount-Doom Plot Twist To Rule Them All at the very end. But I don’t think I’m being too optimistic in thinking that JKR might actually pull it off (thus achieving a full 100 on my “Reading Fun Meter” from the pre-HBP post linked above).

(My biggest fear actually isn’t that the plot will be inadequate, but that JKR would make there be something central to the story that would implicitly ask the reader to buy in on some philosophical or moral point that I’d find unacceptable. The few points of disagreement I’ve had with the stories so far are not major issues for me; but if [hypothetically] she turned into something resembling Philip Pullman [more or less] at the key moment, then it could pretty much spoil the whole series for me. I don’t think she will, at least not beyond what I’d find an acceptable limit; so far she’s mostly stayed within the “Western Consensus” of things that most people in our culture would share, whether religious or otherwise. But the small chance that she’ll do things otherwise, now that she’s finishing, does lurk in my mind a bit. Hopefully nothing will come of this.)

2. I expect Book 7 to be the “ultimate Trio story”—that it will be the last great adventure for Harry, Ron, and Hermione as three best friends, before they go off into adult life as two couples (including Ginny with Harry). None of the books so far have had all three of them working together for the whole book. CoS came the closest, as their friendship there was interrupted only by Hermione being unconscious for two months. But in PS the boys weren’t getting along with Hermione before the Troll incident; in PoA there was the Cat/Rat conflict; in GoF Ron was upset about Harry’s fame and wealth; in OotP Harry was being kind of cranky with everybody; and in HBP we had that Won-Won/Lav-Lav ship trying unsuccessfully to sail. But in DH I expect that Harry will need the best that each of them has to offer (as in the Through the Trapdoor chapter of PS); and I expect that Ron and Hermione will both come through with flying colors.

3. I continue to expect that the hints of Harry not returning to school will turn out to be only a red herring, and that Harry will indeed return at least for most of the year. How he'll be persuaded to return, I don't know. But JKR's comments at various points have always seemed to indicate that Harry has always been planned to have 7 years at Hogwarts, and I would think it easier for the non-return plan to be shot down than for "seven years at Hogwarts" to not actually mean that. (Recall also JKR's hint that we might see the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw common rooms.)

4. But I expect that Harry and Ginny really will keep their relationship on hold until Voldemort is vanquished. Recall that JKR told Melissa and Emerson: "Well, I always knew that that was going to happen, that they were going to come together and then part." The parting is real, and I'm convinced that it's not a mistake on Harry's part (the way stumbling into Snape's Pensieve, or getting fooled into the Dept. of Mysteries trip, was a mistake). Nevertheless Ginny won't be purely in the background: "She does some pretty impressive stuff here and there, and you'll see that again."

5. One interesting question, which I don't think I've seen discussed (although I've been such an infrequent fandom lurker that I could easily have missed it) is: How much will Dumbledore's portrait know? The portraits do seem to remember some things from their lives (recall Phineas saying about how he always hated students). My guess is that the portrait will know some key things, but not everything (otherwise all of Harry's work would be done for him). (What would be even more interesting-- though of course it's not likely-- would be if Dumbledore's joke about the Chocolate Frog cards turned out to be relevant.)

6. I'll also be interested to see if the House unity theme comes back. I don't think JKR owes it to us, and I won't be particularly disapponted if she doesn't; but it could be interesting. In particular, Slughorn, whatever his faults, seems like the sort of Slytherin that Harry can work with, even if Harry doesn't entirely approve of all his views; while Snape, even at his best, didn't really make himself easy to work with. The Theodore Nott backstory would also be interesting here, although I think the odds are against that coming into the story as published.

7. I'm also hoping for a return of the DA in some form (though, again, I think it's less than 50-50). It would be particularly cool if the DA started to use Patronus communication like the Order does.

8. No idea how the Order will function in Dumbledore's absense-- I'm sure they won't disband (!), but don't know if some individual like Moody or McGonagall would become the leader, or if there would be a council of core members, or if they'd do everything by majority vote, or what.

9. I expect at least one big emotional death, but am not sure who. Hagrid and Molly are my two leading candidates for it-- losing Molly would sting more. Am leaning slightly toward Hagrid, I guess. Not sure what Grawp would do if Hagrid died; I suppose there'd be a certain poetic justice in having Lucius end up getting scraped off the bottom of Grawp's boots. (I do expect at least one Weasley to die, though.)

10. Am still leaning toward Draco being dead before the beginning of the story. I don't think he needs to do anything further to be (at least somewhat) redeemed; Harry knows Draco wouldn't have gone through with killing Dumbledore. (Indeed, I'm not entirely dismissing the possibility of JKR tossing a bouquet to our friends on board the Ghost Ship Draco/Myrtle....)

11. Am about 50/50 on Percy reconciling with the family. Could go either way. Am leaning very slightly in favor. But if he doesn't... well, we always knew this wasn't Disney.

...And I think that's about all I have time for. Enjoy the book, everybody!

OotP movie notes

2007-07-16T15:10:33Z

The last few months have been probably my busiest since my last semester of grad school (when I was working two jobs, one with a long commute, and trying to finish a thesis, all at the same time). This year hasn't been that bad, but it has still been a challenge. In March and April I was trying to organize an alumni reunion for the local youth orchestra's 30th anniversary (the job involved going through 30 years of old rosters and putting together an address list), and then coordinating event details with everybody that replied (only about 20 people ended up coming-- it was a nice time for those who came, I think, but it was still a lot of work).

Once that was over, then I had to start working on my next big event-- a sort of informal church mission trip to Albania, for which I'm leaving this Wednesday morning. (So yes, I'm actually going to be on my way to the forests of Albania when Book 7 comes out. Don't worry, I promise not to let Peter Pettigrew take me anywhere to meet Lord Voldemort. But if you don't see me online next weekend, it's because I'll be out of the country.) A friend of mine and I will be doing the Bible teaching at an Albanian church's summer family camp for a week. So I've had to prepare a series of six spoken messages, which (for me at least) is not really an easy thing.

On top of this, it's also been a busy summer at work, with the work on our forthcoming 787 model; it had the ceremonial rollout a week ago (on calendar date 07/08/07, of course), but my work is focused on the certification of it with the government regulators, in preparation for first customer delivery next spring after the flight test program. So I've got a few more months of serious work still to go. If all goes well, I should be able to breathe a bit easier after Christmas or so. (I haven't had to work huge amounts of overtime, but I have had to work some, and with all the other stuff I've been doing, I haven't been able to relax much recently-- if I do relax, it's usually from lack of energy to get stuff done, rather than from saying, "Okay, things are under control, and I can take it easy for a while.")

However, I did manage to take a couple of hours off to see the OotP movie when it came out last week. I liked it, although mainly because I wasn't expecting anything truly great-- it was just a nice illustrated (and abridged) version of the books. I'm not sure how well it would have worked for someone who didn't already know the book; it kind of seemed like several things in it depended on a knowledge of the books in order to make sense. Obviously, in condensing an 870-page book into a 2+ hour film, they had to leave a lot of stuff out; and the effect, I thought, was to reduce the impact a lot, so that both the high and the low moments were less intense than they were in the book.

Things I liked, though, included the DA scenes; a few of the added one-liners (most notably the final "I must not tell lies!"); Hermione's appearance (they didn't try to make her into the hottest girl in the school, they just let her look like Hermione); and Luna's scenes (she's not quite as off-the-wall as in the books, but I thought she was pretty effective, especially for this being Evanna's first time acting the part).

I would have liked a Chocolate Library scene, of course, but one can't have everything. I did notice that they panned over to Ginny a few times in ways that suggested she didn't like the Harry/Cho business very much. Of course we lost the Ginny/Michael Corner subplot in the movie conversion, so as far as the movies are concerned, Ginny's still pining for Harry in OotP. (ETA: I do expect, of course, that she'll still get the Dean subplot in the HBP movie.) And so it seemed uncharacteristically insensitive of Hermione to be talking about Harry and Cho right in front of Ginny on the way back from the Hog's Head meeting. However, a more serious disappointment was the handling of the Harry/Cho breakup; it just seemed like the Inquisitorials trapped her and somehow forced her to give away the DA, and Harry gave her the cold shoulder after that and refused to talk to her when she wanted to (which made Harry seem, at least in that scene, like a bit of a jerk).

So anyway, here are my notebook scribblings from the movie. I started writing when Crookshanks started trying to play with the Extendable Ear and Hermione said, "No! Bad Crookshanks!", which I thought was too funny not to write down. I seem to have scribbled more heavily as the movie went on. (In the notes below, "Awww... Ewwww..." refers to the first two seconds of the Harry/Cho kiss and to the fifth through fifteenth seconds, respectively. The references to the "Veritaserum" and "Occlumency" pronunciation indicate that the accents fell on different syllables from what I'd imagined. "Nice King Kong scene" refers to Grawp meeting ~~Fay Wray~~ Hermione. "[Great Escape music]" refers to my attempted scribbling of the notes of the fast violin music when Fred and George are on their way out. And, by the way, if I were Peter Jackson, that scene with ~~Merry and Pippin's~~ Fred and George's fireworks dragon swooping low over the fleeing crowd would probably have me reaching for the nearest available copyright lawyer's phone number....) Anyway, the notebook scribblings follow:

Bad Crookshanks!
“Whinging” pronunciation
Fudge Citizen Kane portrait?
Harry in a suit?
Pretty mangy Animagus form, Sirius
when do we meet Luna?
Neville can’t see thestrals?
Nice kittens, Dolores.
Hermione looks more like herself.
Thestral foal!
Good scene w/Luna
Minerva-Dolores smackdown
(still no Percy?) (oh, there he is)
Trelawney sacked earlier?
Difft. sort of fire-head
“no worse than old toadface”
“thx Ron”
(Nice shot of Hogsmeade.)
(who cares? ?!)
Camera to Ginny when Cho mentioned
nice accent by C/G on “Longbo’om.”
cool to see Neville open the door
uh-oh, Filch….
Love the DA scenes!
Ginny worried about Cho
Cedric’s picture—nice touch.
Mistletoe growing?!
Awww….. Ewww….
teaspoon—didn’t you people read the books?
Attack on Mr W
Occlumency now?
(will we see Frank & Alice?)
read, control, unhinge….
Oc’clumency?
Black fam. Tree
sp. “Phineus”?
Interesting scene w/ Sirius: “what if becoming bad”
(should’ve told us re. Regulus)
Hagrid’s back!
Bellatrix in Azkaban!
Neville—parents?
Patronuses: Ginny horse, Luna rabbit?
Percy?
Kingsley: “Dumbledore’s got style!”
(lots of storms….)
Cho?
Grawp….
(no Firenze)
nice King Kong scene
Just stay away from her
Feeling sentimental?
Interesting spin on Worst Mem.
F&G: no Great Escape?
[Great Escape music]
Nice remake of M&P’s dragon
Flitwick fist-pump
uh-oh—kitten messenger
Ve’rita ser’um?
Improvising!
Really hate children!
Tell them I mean no harm
I must not tell lies!
Clever, Ron—known to happen
(no Chocolate Libr.—too bad.)
Prophecy….
Better now th. abt. to be avenged!
Impressive prophecy destr.
Veil room.
Nice duel, Albus & Tom….
AK on Sirius?
He’s back…. Vindicated!

Anyway, I may or may not find time to post any final thoughts on expectations for Book 7. I won't really have anything new and exciting to say, I don't think; most things I could discuss about the book are in one of three categories: (1) things everybody sort of knows (like Regulus and the Locket); (2) things where I don't even have any intelligent speculation (like what the Ravenclaw horcrux will be, assuming that there is one); (3) things where I know what my guess is, but most of you seem to be guessing differently, and there's not really anything more to say (like Harry probably returning to school, at least for most of the year).

There may still be a few interesting things I can manage; but time may not permit (I've spent too much time on this post already!). If not... happy Book 7 release, everybody!

Book 7 stuff, etc.

2007-04-01T08:00:31Z

(1) Cover art and page counts

I was caught a bit off guard to discover that the new book art is already released. All of the pictures are effective, I think, in suggesting interesting possibilities without actually giving us concrete information prematurely. On the US picture, I'm guessing that the possible absence of a scar is probably not significant (though it's worth keeping in the back of my mind as a possibility). The absence of wands has me leaning more toward significance. And who are those people watching? (Death eaters, someone has suggested? I suppose that could make sense. Whoever they are, though, the concept of spectators at The Final Smackdown seems a bit surprising, if indeed that's what's going on. Furthermore... where are they-- the Hogwarts Quidditch pitch?!?)

On the UK picture, my initial guess was (and to some extent still is) that the Trio are in some kind of treasure room associated with Voldemort. I guess this because I'm expecting that to be a Horcrux scene (note that the Hufflepuff Cup could easily be there). Some have suggested Gringotts; if so, then this would presumably be something besides an attempted Horcrux discovery. As for the House-Elf: My guess is Dobby; the Elf looks ugly but not wrinkled like Kreacher.

It will be interesting to find out how Harry ends up waiting in Privet Drive. That suggests at least a bit of a change of plans from the end of HBP, when Harry's planning to go ahead on the Horcrux Hunt, accompanied by Ron & Hermione only because they insist, and certainly not waiting for anyone's permission. Will there be an attack at King's Cross? Will Lupin or Moody or somebody talk Harry into cooperating more with the Order? I wish I knew.

What I can talk more definitely about, though, is the page counts (784 US, 608 UK). My first thought was that that seemed like an awfully big difference between the two editions. But consider the following table:

US vs. UK Page Counts & Densities
Book	Words	US Pages	UK Pages	Ratio	US Words/Page	UK Words/Page
PS/SS	76944	309	223	1.39	249	345
CoS	85141	341	256	1.33	250	333
PoA	107253	435	317	1.37	247	338
GoF	190637	734	636	1.15	260	300
OotP	257034	870	766	1.14	295	336
HBP	168923	652	607	1.07	259	278
DH	???	784	608	1.29	???	???

So the US/UK page count ratio isn't the highest here. It's only back approaching the range of the first three books, when the US books averaged about 250 words/page and the British typically about 340. In this case, if you assume a words/page density of 260 for the US edition (about the same as GoF and HBP, and slightly higher than the first three), the 1.29 ratio gives you about 335 words/page for the UK (close to all the books except GoF and HBP, for which the UK edition was, surprisingly to me, less densely printed). This further would translate into a word count of about 204,000-- about 7% longer than GoF and 21% longer than HBP, but still 21% shorter than OotP.

(So my initial guess of a 220K-word book was probably too high, and my more recent guess based on the book pricing was even more mistaken.)

(2) Also, about that Arthur Levine comment:

I do not see that "sobbing" necessarily indicates an unhappy ending; just, as Levine said, a very "emotional" book. I myself am not (as you might guess) the type to get weepy over books or movies or whatever; but the moments that do get me a bit choked up or misty-eyed (which is as far as I go down that path) are not usually moments where people die-- just what you might call "emotionally impacting plot twists." (There are several moments in Narnia that I would classify thus; most notably when Aslan revives that dying old dwarfish-looking woman, and she turns out to be Caspian's old nurse.) And in the case of HP book 7, my guess is that whatever the Big Final Revelation About Lily Evans Potter turns out to be, could easily have a similar effect, regardless of whether we lose any of the major characters we had hoped would live.

I did happen to be flipping idly through HBP last week, though (during an unsuccessful effort to get to sleep one evening), and noticed the bit where Harry notices that the Weasley Family Clock "was perched awkwardly on top of a pile of sheets in the washing backet at the end of the table," and guesses that "its current position suggested that Mrs. Weasley had taken to carrying it around the house with her." This seems like it might be a reminder that the Worries of Mrs. Weasley are still important, and will come into play again before the end. I'll be surprised if we don't lose at least one Weasley. (I continue to be confident about Harry and Ginny, and also about Ron and Hermione; but I suspect that Fred and George are worth worrying about-- not to mention Molly herself. :shudder: )

Overall, though, I am becoming increasingly optimistic about the final sequence of DH surpassing even that of PoA for a rapid-fire series of slam-bang plot twists, so that the book could well displace PoA as the "consensus fan favorite." As usual, though, of course: "We'll see."

(And even in the seemingly unlikely event that Harry should die: I trust JKR to do it right.)

(3) Monthly Quiz #3: CoS Quotes

I give you below the first spoken quotation from each chapter from CoS, in order (or, if that gave too much away, the beginning of the first quote-- except for #6, where that would probably have made it impossible to the point of being uninteresting). Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to identify the person speaking in each case. (If you need more of a challenge, you may also identify the person spoken to, and describe the context.)

1. "Third time this week!"
2. "May I take your coats, Mr. and Mrs. Mason?"
3. "Ron!"
4. "Tuck your shirt in, scruffy!"
5. "Not a word to Molly."
6. "Post's due any minute-- I think Gran's sending on a few things I forgot."
7. "All right, Harry?"
8. "...Don't fulfill their requirements...."
9. "What's going on here? What's going on?"
10. "Nice loud howl, Harry-- exactly--"
11. "All in order. When you've finished eating, you may leave."
12. "Bee in your bonnet, Harry Potter?"
13. "If I'd sprouted whiskers, I'd take a break from work."
14. "Riddle might have got the wrong person."
15. "We're taking no more chances. No, I'm sorry, there's every chance the attacker might come back to finish these people off...."
16. "All those times we were in that bathroom...."
17. "Ginny!"
18. "Ginny!"

More HP Stuff (including another quiz)

2007-02-19T07:20:56Z

(1) Concerning Book 7:

...(a) JKR's comments on the release date:

JKR, in the "Rumours" section of her website, comments that the release date was set for July 21, rather than July 7, because "An earlier date ... would have meant that either the writing or editing was rushed."

The reasoning isn't entirely obvious here. Counting from the Balmoral Room 652 completion date of January 11, she's given herself and her editors 191 days to do the job. This contrasts with the draft-completion-to-publication times of 104 (apparently), 157, and 208 days on the three previous really big HP books (GoF, OotP, and HBP, respectively; see my discussion here). It's clear that 104 days (if that's what GoF was) was too short (remember the wand-order mixup); but I don't recall that OotP had any major editing problems with 157 days to work with, nor do I see any reason why 191 days would be enough for HPDH but 177 days (to July 7) would not.

What I tend to guess happened here is that one or both of her editors drafted out a schedule of what they thought would work for the successful completion of the job, that JKR accepted it as they recommended, and that none of them was particularly concerned with the symbolism of having Book 7 released on 7/7/07 ("the most powerfully magical number," indeed!).

I suspect that they (JKR, Emma Matthewson from Bloomsbury, and Arthur Levine) could probably have compressed the schedule to do a 7/7/07 release if they had so chosen; maybe there are reasons why they couldn't repeat OotP's 157-day schedule, but if so I don't know what they'd be. It would have been fun if JKR and the editors had liked the 7/7/07 idea as much as we do; but evidently it's no big deal to them. Such is life. They're the ones giving us the book, so I guess we can't complain! :-)

...(b) $34.99?

There has been some discussion of whether the higher price (US $34.99, when even OotP was $29.99) indicates that this will be the longest book yet. I think that this is possible, but not certain; according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' CPI Inflation Calculator, $29.99 four years ago is worth $33.61 now (using 2002 vs. 2006 for the comparison, as 2007 CPI data aren't out yet). So in terms of "real" (inflation-discounted) value, the HPDH price is only slightly higher than that of OotP-- the difference is slight enough that other factors besides page count (including "rounding off to the nearest $5") could account for the difference.

Nevertheless I am now tentatively expecting a book of length comparable to OotP's, and with a chapter count exceeding 40; as I commented here, Book 7 will have more natural turning points in the plot (due to the successive Horcrux pursuits) than OotP did, and is therefore likely to have a shorter average chapter length.

...(c) JKR's Favorite

I was pleased to see JKR's comment that "Deathly Hallows is my favourite." I'm not surprised that this is true, but it's reassuring to see her say so in print (which tells us that she's pretty emphatic in holding that opinion). It's not a guarantee that it will be my favorite also, of course-- in the past she's identified CoS and GoF as particular favorites, when it's always seemed obvious to me that PoA is the most natural favorite to have. But it does at least increase my level of hope that HPDH will be really, really good.

It also tends to further confirm that Harry will indeed survive the final battle with Voldemort. Yes, it's technically possible that JKR could write a tragic ending and still have the book be, not just a favorite, but an emphatic favorite (so that she'd make a point of telling us so). But, from what we know about JKR, I think it's true that she likes happiness, and that she'd get the most joy from writing a mostly-happy ending. I must add "mostly-," of course, since some characters we really like will die, and some plot threads that we had hoped would get nicely wrapped up will get cut off instead (kind of like how, before OotP, I had hoped that Sirius and Snape would eventually manage to get beyond their old school rivalry). But still, I expect that we'll come away from the book thinking, "Yeah, this was a great (and fun) book!", even in spite of whatever horrors Voldemort manages to unleash within its pages.

(I still hold the expectations described here; see especially the "Reading Fun Meter" chart. I can see how prettyannamoon would say of PoA (in the comments thread to that post) that "I think it's not only my favorite, but probably always will be. There's a great innocence and simplicity to it that the later books (as good as they may be) can't possibly replicate." True enough; that'll have to be a matter of taste, reflecting one's generally preference between kids' books and young adult books. For myself, though, I'm still hopeful that HPDH will end up as my overall favorite of the series.)

(2) Whither Fawkes?

I don't think I've commented on this before, but: It seems to me odd that JKR heavily hinted, in the post-HBP Cub Reporters interview, that Fawkes would return in Book 7 ("I am not going to answer about the role in the next book, which probably gives you a big clue"), even though HBP says that after Fawkes' lament for Dumbledore, Harry "knew... that the phoenix had gone, had left Hogwarts for good" (HBP, p. My best guess is that Fawkes will appear in the final battle with Voldemort. But we'll see.

(3) Blinky and Weatherby

One interesting feature of the books is the way JKR uses certain characters' inattention to people's names, to draw attention to those characters' inattention to people. The first example of this is in CoS, where Prof. Binns calls Hermione "Miss Grant" and Seamus "O'Flaherty"; and it comes up again in HBP with Prof. Slughorn ("your poor friend Rupert"; which, by the way, I thought was perhaps the funniest line in the book, so that it quite disappointed me that Arthur Levine had to explain it to people).

This also comes up twice in GoF; first with Mr. Crouch's mangling of Percy's last name (much to Fred and George's delight, of course)-- which makes it heavily ironic that the second instance is when Percy remarks that "Mr. Crouch suffered a huge personal shock with the misbehavior of that house-elf of his, Blinky, or whatever she was called."

(Of course it's not certain that JKR intended the irony; but I tend to guess that she probably did.)

(And incidentally: Percy's is one of the subplots about which I'm moderately pessimistic for Book 7. But we'll see.)

(4) And finally: Here's another quiz. As before, this involves putting chapter excerpts in order. This time, I'm giving you the beginning of each chapter of PS/SS, and asking you to put them in order, 1 through 17.

At this point I'm not giving you chapter titles; if I did it would be way too easy. (That's a hint, by the way: If you can remember at least a few chapter titles and which chapter number they go with, that will help.) If it turns out to be too hard for people, I'll come in and start giving titles of appropriately selected chapters, and see if that helps.

Your chapter titles to sort out are:

(a) Harry woke early the next morning. Although he could tell it was daylight, he kept his eyes shut tight. "It was a dream," he told himself firmly.

(b) Things couldn't have been worse.

(c) Quirrell, however, must have been braver than they'd thought. In the weeks that followed he did seem to be getting paler and thinner, but it didn't look as though he'd cracked yet.

(d) As they entered November, the weather turned very cold.

(e) The door swung open at once. A tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood there.

(f) Harry's last month with the Dursleys wasn't fun.

(g) Harry had never believed he would meet a boy he hated more than Dudley, but that was before he met Draco Malfoy.

(h) Dumbledore had convinced Harry not to go looking for the Mirror of Erised again, and for the rest of the Christmas holidays the invisibility cloak stayed folded at the bottom of his trunk.

(i) In years to come, Harry would never quite remember how he had managed to get through his exams when he half expected Voldemort to come bursting through the door at any moment.

(j) BOOM. They knocked again. Dudley jerked awake. "Where's the cannon?" he said stupidly.

(k) Malfoy couldn't believe his eyes when he saw that Harry and Ron were still at Hogwarts the next day, looking tired but perfectly cheerful.

(l) Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.

(m) The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned Harry his longest-ever punishment.

(n) It was Quirrell.

(o) Nearly ten years had passed since the Dursleys had woken up to find their nephew on the front step, but Privet Drive had hardly changed at all.

(p) Christmas was coming. One morning in mid-December, Hogwarts awoke to find itself covered in several feet of snow.

(q) "There, look." "Where?" "Next to the tall kid with the red hair." "Wearing the glasses?" "Did you see his face?" "Did you see his scar?"

(By the way, top honors last time went to alphielj, with honorable mentions to prettyannamoon [a full-marks paper turned in shortly after Alphie's], and to tartanboxers [first to respond, with only one pair of chapters transposed]. Good luck, everybody!) :-)

ETA: I guess this was easier than I thought it would be! Top honors to tartanboxers, with alphielj also receiving full marks, and peachespig and lilac_bearry having one mistake each. Nice job!

Miscellaneous HP Stuff

2007-01-25T07:48:41Z

(1) An HP Dream (no, not the MLK Jr. kind of dream-- the real, literal kind)

Amusingly enough, about a month after JKR reported having dreamed about Book 7, so did I, a week or so ago. (This is odd, as I really haven't spent all that much time thinking about HP in the last year-and-a-few-months.)

In my dream, Book 7 had come out, and I was reading it. The dream sort of shifted back and forth, though-- sometimes I was reading the book, and sometimes I was in the story (though I'm pretty sure I was always just an observer, like in a Pensieve-- I don't think I ever actually was Harry in the dream, and I certainly wasn't anybody else).

However, as dreams go, this was a pretty ill-informed one. The Book 7 in the dream took no noticeable account of the events of Book 6; Dumbledore was still alive (not "back from the dead," but "still alive"), Snape was still just a mysteriously unpleasant teacher, and the central focus of the plot had nothing to do with Horcruxes. Rather, it involved Dumbledore organizing a secret mission for ten of his people (including himself; Harry was also one, and so was Snape, and possibly Ron). I had read on the back cover that something was going to go wrong, and eight of the ten were going to die in some tragic event. I was trying to work out who the two that survived were going to be: Harry and Snape? Harry and Ron? Harry and Ginny? (Although I don't think Ginny was really one of the group of ten.)

The other odd thing was that JKR seemed to have organized the narration so as to try to define more explicitly the relation of the story to the Christian faith-- as if the story were deliberately trying to avoid contradicting Christianity while operating in a different realm. (This bit in the dream probably came from Tom Shippey's books on LotR, in which he describes Tolkien as doing more or less that sort of thing.)

What was really weird was that I woke up briefly-- something about the heat or cold in my condo, I think-- and thought, "But no, of course it had to be a dream-- Book 7 won't be anything like that," before going back to sleep and falling back into the same dream.

One of the weirder dreams I've had, I think.

(2) Judas Riddle?

Also, a week ago Sunday, one of my students at church dropped an odd HP reference into the class discussion. We were covering the last few chapters of the Gospel According to Luke, and had gotten to the betrayal of Jesus by Judas Iscariot. One of the girls in the class, for some reason, piped up:

"I think of Judas as looking like that guy from Harry Potter."

"Oh, you mean Professor Snape?" one of the boys asked.

"No, that-- that guy that turned out to be Lord Voldemort," she clarified.

"You don't mean Tom Riddle?" I asked.

"Yeah! Him!"

It was actually a pretty good observation. The greasy-haired Potions master is the natural association to make, of course. But the gospels declare clearly enough that it wasn't obvious to the other disciples beforehand that Judas was going to be the betrayer ("Lord, it is I?"). So the young-Riddle-type image of the decent-looking guy who turns out to be evil, actually makes more sense in context.

(Note: Yes, I'm aware that JKR has made reference to the tradition of Judas being a redhead. From what I've read, this is one of several possibilities of what "Iscariot" might mean, but far from a certainty; a more likely one may be "Judas of Kerioth," where "Kerioth" is the name of a couple of different villages in first-century Palestine. In any case, I think there are much better reasons to think he looked like a fine, upstanding citizen than to think he looked unusual in a way that would have made people wonder if he was normal-- recall, of course, that redheaded Middle Easterners are not a common occurrence.)

(3) The Amusing Prophecies of Ronald Weasley

Speaking of redheaded guys....

A few days ago I was flipping through PoA, and noticed the bit where the Trio meets Sir Cadogan, and the scene ends up with Ron saying, "Yeah, we'll call you if we ever need someone mental."

But then, it could be argued a that few weeks later, after the Flight of the Fat Lady, Gryffindor House really did need someone mental; and so on whom did they call but that very same Sir Cadogan?

(Apologies if somebody else has already pointed that out!)

(4) And finally: Anyone up for a quiz?

Also in flipping through PoA, I noticed that an awful lot of the chapters (including several in a row during the school-year section) seem to end with stunning turning points. And so it occurred to me to offer the following quiz.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to match each chapter with its ending (example: "1a 2b 3c...," etc.)... WITHOUT looking in the book. (My hope is that it will be challenging enough to be interesting, but not so impossible as to be pointless to try at. We'll see. If nothing else, it should at least give you an excuse to relive a lot of great moments from a terrific story.)

CHAPTERS: (listed in book order)

1. Owl Post
2. Aunt Marge's Big Mistake
3. The Knight Bus
4. The Leaky Cauldron
5. The Dementor
6. Talons and Tea Leaves
7. The Boggart in the Wardrobe
8. Flight of the Fat Lady
9. Grim Defeat
10. The Marauder's Map
11. The Firebolt
12. The Patronus
13. Gryffindor versus Ravenclaw
14. Snape's Grudge
15. The Quidditch Final
16. Professor Trelawney's Prediction
17. Cat, Rat, and Dog
18. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs
19. The Servant of Lord Voldemort
20. The Dementor's Kiss
21. Hermione's Secret
22. Owl Post Again

CHAPTER ENDINGS: (listed in random order)

a. Crookshanks leapt lightly off the bed and led the way out of the room, his bottle-brush tail held jauntily high.

b. "That's the spirit, dear," said his mirror sleepily.

c. They reached their familiar, circular dormitory with its five four-poster beds and Harry, looking around, felt he was home at last.

d. If only their had been a Dementor around… As a sobbing Wood passed Harry the Cup, as he lifted it into the air, Harry felt he could have produced the world's best Patronus.

e. "It's been a very weird night, Hedwig," he yawned. And without even removing his glasses, he slumped back onto his pillows and fell asleep.

f. And grinning broadly at the look of horror on Uncle Vernon's face, Harry set off towards the station exit, Hedwig rattling along in front of him, for what looked like a much better summer than the last.

g. Ron threw something down onto Hermione's Rune translation. Hermione and Harry leant forward. Lying on top of the weird, spiky shapes were several long, ginger cat hairs.

h. "Because I thought - and Professor McGonagall agrees with me - that that broom was probably sent to Harry by Sirius Black!"

i. Slowly, she reached down for a bag at her feet, turned it upside-down and tipped a dozen bits of splintered wood and twig onto the bed, the only remains of Harry's faithful, finally beaten broomstick.

j. "An Animagus," said Black, "by the name of Peter Pettigrew."

k. "What would it have been for you?" said Ron, sniggering. "A piece of homework that only got nine out of ten?"

l. Harry and Hermione jumped back as the enormous wings rose once more… the Hippogriff took off into the air… he and his rider became smaller and smaller as Harry gazed after them… then a cloud drifted across the moon… they were gone.

m. "No," said Hermione. She was holding a letter in her hands and her lip was trembling. "I just thought you ought to know… Hagrid lost his case. Buckbeak is going to be executed."

n. Hermione swayed on the spot. "They did it!" she whispered to Harry. "I d-don't believe it - they did it!"

o. There was utter silence, broken by the smallest of terrified squeaks. Neville Longbottom, trembling from head to fluffy-slippered toes, raised his hand slowly into the air.

p. "I'm takin' yer all back up ter school, an' don' let me catch yet walkin' down ter see me after dark again. I'm not worth that!"

q. Ron and Hermione's faces appeared under the table. They were both staring at him, lost for words.

r. Severus Snape was pulling off the Invisibility Cloak, his wand pointing directly at Lupin.

s. Extremely unusual though he was, at that moment Harry Potter felt just like everyone else: glad, for the first time, that it was his birthday.

t. "Nasty temper he's got, that Sirius Black."

u. And next moment, he was out in the dark, quiet street, heaving his heavy trunk behind him, Hedwig's cage under his arm.

v. Harry didn't understand. He couldn't think any more. He felt the last of his strength leave him, and his head hit the ground as he fainted.

Further thoughts on "HPDH"

2007-01-03T23:05:26Z

(I started to write this as part of my reply to perceval on the previous thread, but decided to split this part out as its own post.)

My position-- now that I've had a couple of weeks to consider the title-- is still more or less what it was:

(1) I think "sacred place" is the most likely sense of "hallows," followed by "sacred objects." I would have a hard time seeing JKR using it to refer to "holy [and presumably deceased] people," although I'm not sure I can rule that out absolutely.

...(a) I could see her using the "hallows" with sort of a dual reference, both to a sacred place and to the sacred objects that are kept there.

...(b) I could see it referring to a cemetery, or perhaps to the Death Room (Veil Room) at the Ministry.

...(c) If "hallows" refers to place, it could be either singular or plural (one place or many places). If it's "many places," then it seems like it could conceivably be Voldemort's own phrase for the places where the Horcruxes are kept (though that may be too much of a stretch; I'm admittedly grasping at straws for ideas here).

(2) As for "deathly," the definitions at dictionary.com allow it to be a synonym of "deadly" (i.e. "causing death"), but also allow the more general sense of "pertaining to death." I'm guessing that JKR means "pertaining to death" (or "deathlike," "resembling death," etc.), partly because if she had meant "deadly" she would probably have used that more specific term, and also because something like "pertaining to death" seems to fit the story better.

However, all of the above suggestions are only "guesses" (free-association conjectures about what JKR might have meant). I have no "theories" in the sense of "serious expectations about what JKR is probably up to with that title," nor do I expect to until she gives us further hints.

Note: Until a consensus develops otherwise, am supporting reference to Book 7 as "HPDH," to reduce risks of ambiguity.)

On the Book Seven Title

2006-12-21T19:59:59Z

So now we know: It's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

This of course leads to the question-- as I've seen discussed on a few other people's LJ's already: "What exactly does she mean by hallows?"

The first point to make stems from a misunderstanding of the term "Hallowe'en" ("All Hallows' Eve"). The term as used here does not refer to the souls of dead people in general. The medieval church holiday system celebrated (and present-day Catholicism still does celebrate) "All Souls Day" on November 2, and "All Saints Day" on November 1. "Saints" here refers to the departed faithful who are believed to have already attained heavenly bliss, while the November 2 holiday honors the faithful departed who are believed to be still atoning for their sins in Purgatory. (As far as I know there is no holiday to celebrate the unfaithful departed!)

A search of dictionary.com doesn't show any noun meanings of "hallow" or "hallows" that would be possible senses here. peachespig cites a couple of meanings from the OED: "a holy person, a saint" and "the shrines or relics of saints or of heathen gods." The first of those definitions is the one that has filtered into our term "hallowe'en" via the "All Saints" holiday. The second of these also carries the "holiness" root meaning, but with the sense of "holy object" or perhaps "holy place." (Note that the phrase "Hallowed be Thy name" in the King James translation of The Lord's Prayer carries the meaning of "May Your name be recognized as holy.")

I can most easily imagine the "holy place" meaning as pertaining to the Book 7 title (are we going to call it "DH" now?). One analogy that comes to mind-- although he uses "hallow" as a verb-- is Lincoln's Gettysburg Address: "We cannot hallow this ground; the brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it." To refer to the battlefield at Gettysburg as a "hallows" would, I think, make good sense (it would be a secular adaptation of the term; but to some extent JKR would be doing the same).

I don't at all think the term in Book 7 will refer to Godric's Hollow; indeed, I think that would have been more likely had it not involved a pun like that! But it is true that, from Harry's perspective, Godric's Hollow is sort of a hallows.

What I'm imagining is Harry's final confrontation with Voldemort taking place at some ancient magical site, one having some association with death. Further details are beyond my present ability to imagine. But we'll see what JKR comes up with. (And, although a late-summer release still doesn't seem better than 50-50, I do think it's quite likely that we'll at least have the book by Christmas 2007.)

Time from completion to publication; Fantasy or school story?

2006-12-21T06:03:20Z

Two issues here:

(1) I note that it was two years ago today (December 20; see the HPL timeline) that JKR announced the completion of HBP. Her publishers followed this shortly with the announcement of a publication schedule for the following July 16.

I commented a bit on this a few months ago, and still mostly stand by those remarks. Of course, with every day that passes without substantive information, the reasonable-to-expect probability of a summer release goes down ever so slightly; in September I said 50-50, now I might say 40-60.

The key question remains: How late can JKR finish and still allow a summer 2007 release? OotP took 157 days, HBP 208 (I suspect that HBP may have taken that long more for marketing reasons than for the actual mechanics of publication). My memory of GoF was that it was pretty quick, and this HPFGU archive post (sorry, membership required) seems to confirm it as having been only 104 days (exactly half of HBP's 208, amusingly). My guess is that they won't crunch it that tightly again; wouldn't want any wand-order type mixups on Book 7!

I'm inclined to say that four months (about 120 days) would be the minimum schedule, and 150 days would be a pretty safe one. So, to have a release by the end of August, JKR would need to finish by the end of April at the latest, and more likely by the end of March. Which I don't think is impossible. The title of HBP was one that JKR had liked for a long time, and so I can well imagine that she settled on that earlier in the writing process than is becoming the case with Book 7. Furthermore, the OotP title ended up meaning something different than what she originally intended (see the discussion here on how the Order and the DA seem to have swapped identities during the writing process). So I can imagine that, if she's in doubt about the title, she might want to hold off on publicizing what it would be.

Nevertheless, it does seem true that the completion of the manuscript is not imminent. She's not giving the sense of "any-day-now" that we had at this time two years ago. I'm still hoping for a March release, even if such hopes are becoming steadily less realistic; but I'd be surprised if it were much earlier than March.

I might also mention: It seems possible that Book 7 might be longer than HBP, and that this might partly explain the time it's taking JKR to write it. (Of course that's not the only possible explanation; but it seems reasonable.) At this point I'm sticking with my earlier prediction of 220K words, 800 US pages, and 39 chapters (though I'm tempted to bump the chapter guess up to 40!); but I am becoming more confident that I didn't shoot too high with those guesses.

************

(2) On a rather different subject: I've been thinking a bit about JKR's remarks on the fantasy genre, from the July 2005 Time interview:

The most popular living fantasy writer in the world doesn't even especially like fantasy novels. It wasn't until after Sorcerer's Stone was published that it even occurred to her that she had written one. "That's the honest truth," she says. "You know, the unicorns were in there. There was the castle, God knows. But I really had not thought that that's what I was doing. And I think maybe the reason that it didn't occur to me is that I'm not a huge fan of fantasy."

Of course it's well-known how Terry Pratchett gave some rather snarky comments in reply to the above. But the thought has since occurred to me: Is it really correct to label the HP stories as "Fantasy"?

That is: It has often been remarked that the HP stories use a lot of elements from the school-story genre (Encarta, for example, says "The Harry Potter books combine two powerful genres—the school story and magical fantasy—but Rowling’s treatment of these is almost entirely original"). So my question is: Is it more accurate to view HP as a fantasy story with boarding-school elements, or as a boarding-school story with fantasy elements?

I can certainly agree that it's fairly close to 50-50. Certainly both were part of JKR's original vision ("boy finds out he's a wizard and goes to wizard school"). Yet I am inclined to view the school-story aspects as more fundamental to the series, and the fantasy elements as more of an added characteristic. In which case JKR's slowness in associating her story with the fantasy genre makes a fair amount of sense.

(But I reserve the right to alter or refine the above opinion. I would not say that I've yet gotten to the bottom of the question.)

My Latest Musical Adventure

2006-12-11T05:22:48Z

...had its origin last spring, when the youth orchestra for which I volunteer was preparing for its annual concerto auditions, in which members of the orchestra can try out for the chance to be featured as a soloist with the orchestra during the following school year.

At one point, I heard that two of the students from the viola section were interested in playing J.S. Bach's Brandenburg Concerto #6, but that they had been told that it wouldn't work because it's not for orchestra. (Bach's original scoring features two violas, backed up by two violas da gamba [sort of like small cellos played between the knees], a cello, and a bass with harpsichord.) "What?!" I thought. "This is too good a piece to tell people they can't do it for lack of orchestration-- I'll make an orchestration for it myself."

So I did, though just the first movement at that point. When the time for the auditions came, however, some other candidates placed higher, and we didn't end up needing the orchestration after all. But I kept it on file, just in case it should come in handy sometime.

Then, this fall, I happened to find out that a local amateur orchestra had scheduled the piece, now with four student soloists (the original two for whom I'd done the orchestration, plus two friends of theirs who shared the same private teacher; they were doing it with two of them on each of the solo parts). I was having some correspondence at that time with the other orchestra's board president about some music they were borrowing from my youth orchestra, and so I inquired: "I notice you've got the kids doing Brandenburg 6; do you need an orchestration?"

It turned out that they had been planning to do Bach's original version (except with the viola da gamba parts played on normal cellos), but that they were quite interested in having an orchestra version if I was going to offer them one. So I went to work, and finished a draft of the second and third movements in time to have them try it out at rehearsal and let me make corrections.

And so today was the performance, and it went well and everybody was happy. :-) I'm not sure if I'm quite satisfied with it enough to start offering it to music publishers; but it could realistically turn out to be a sellable product (perhaps with a bit more refinement first). It's a pretty famous piece, and it seems natural that violists would want to play it with an orchestra; and so it surprises me that there don't seem to be any standard published orchestrations available. So maybe there's a market niche to be filled here. We'll see.

*****

I also ended up bringing my own viola and playing in the orchestra for this concert (though I'm not a permanent member-- the time commitment would be difficult). One further bit of amusement was at the final rehearsal yesterday morning, when they were working on Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante for violin, viola, and orchestra. At the rehearsal, the solo violinist was there but the violist was unable to attend; and so they asked, "Hey, does anybody here know the solo viola part to this piece?" Which I did; so up I stepped as a rehearsal substitute. It went reasonably well; my fingers got tangled up on a few sixteenth-note passages, but for the most part I was able to remember it. I wouldn't have wanted to do a concert performance of that quality; but for having been a rehearsal substitute with no advance warning, I'm happy with how I did.

(What I didn't tell them was that I hadn't actually practiced the piece for about seventeen years! But it remains one of my favorites to listen to, and it's not technically very difficult except for the few parts that I messed up; so I was able to get it back pretty well on the first attempt.)

*****

On a similar topic: I've posted the MIDI sound file for The Cat and the Fiddle (from LotR) on my website. Hope you enjoy it!

(Warning: It uses the BGSOUND tag, which only works on IE browsers [not Firefox or Netscape]. I haven't figured out how to make it work on all browsers yet; sorry!)

An amusing mental picture

2006-10-07T05:41:21Z

So, when TLC posted the headline this week saying "Owls are delivering W.O.M.B.A.T. results"...

Was I the only one to have thought, "Well, I suppose that's better than if it were the other way around"?

(P.S. No, I don't have any results coming. Had intended to try to find my student ID from the first exam, but couldn't find it where I thought it was filed, and then JKR.com closed up shop before I could do a more thorough search. Oh well.)

Fun Geography Fact for the Day

2006-09-21T20:19:54Z

There actually exists-- just off of I-5 between Seattle and Portland-- a town called Vader, Washington.

I've often found it amusing to ponder what their school's football uniforms must look like.

"Not close to finishing"

2006-09-13T07:42:18Z

Until recently, I had sort of been tentatively assuming that JKR would finish the manuscript of Book 7 sometime around the end of this year, and that it would be released sometime in the summer of 2007 (indeed, I was quite fond of the 7/7/07 theory, even while recognizing the uncertainty as to whether the publishers would release the book within a week of the OotP movie).

My doubts about this timetable had been increasing in recent weeks, however; and now JKR's Rubbish Bin update seems to give further evidence for a pessimistic view, saying that she's "not close to finishing it yet."

Recall the following:

September 19, 2002 (Hermione's birthday): JKR tells Lizo that OotP now has "a beginning, a middle and an end - you could read it all the way through," but that she wants "a bit more time to tweak."

January 15, 2003: Bloomsbury and Scholastic announce OotP publication date as June 21.

June 21, 2003: OotP released.

********

June 28, 2004: JKR.com's "Room of Requirement" announces title of HBP.

August 16, 2004: JKR.com gives "Old Lion" excerpt (which turns out to be a description of Scrimgeour).

October 31, 2004: JKR.com gives three chapter titles: "Spinner's End," "Draco's Detour," and "Felix Felicis."

December 20, 2004: JKR announces submission of HBP to publishers, followed shortly by publishers' announcement of book release the following July 16.

July 16, 2005: HBP released.

********

So by this time four (!?) years ago, OotP was more or less readable, and just needed some tweaking. By this time two years ago, JKR had long since given us the title, and had added an excerpt from what turned out to be chapter one (and, as it turned out, was three months shy of submitting the manuscript). And now she says she's "not close to finishing."

I stress that I am not complaining. I'd rather have a realistically-optimal Book 7 in 2008 than a rush job in 2007, of course! But this re-setting of my expectations seems significant enough to be worth discussing publicly. (And I recognize that it's not impossible that JKR could still finish the manuscript by December or January, allowing a midsummer release next year. But that has come to seem unlikely.)

One question that naturally arises is: Suppose JKR finishes the manuscript in, say, May of 2007. What then? Would the publishers violate the usual midsummer-release pattern and give us a pre-Christmas Book 7? I tend to think they probably would; they'd probably make themselves a target for a good deal of public complaining otherwise; and, besides, the time value of money means that businesses generally prefer to get our dollars sooner rather than later. I can't see that the incremental sales advantage of a midsummer release would outweigh the disadvantages of holding on to it for much longer than they need to. (Indeed, I was surprised that the editing-and-publishing process took as long as 7 months for HBP.)

Or-- looking at the question from another angle-- what if JKR finishes in, say, March? In that case I could see a release in July or August; the publishers did a pretty quick job of it for GoF, as I recall (although at the cost of having to correct the wand-order mixup after the release, and then having to deal with some public complaints from fans whose sense of reasonableness in their theories wasn't perhaps quite what it might have been).

If they can't do August (i.e. when most Northern-hemisphere schools are on summer holidays), then I could see them holding it until maybe November or so, to get in on a pre-Christmas rush. (No, Halloween 2007 isn't on a weekend. I checked.) The value of catching customers in a holiday-purchase mode would probably justify holding onto the "inventory" for an extra couple of months.

So perhaps the real question is: Will JKR finish in time for a release by the end of next summer? This would probably require a completed manuscript by the end of April or so. That still seems realistic to hope for; after all, she wrote pretty much the whole of HBP in calendar year 2004 (recall that JKR spent most of 2003 full-time mothering her then-infant son David, as she did with Mackenzie in 2005).

And so I'm still giving us about a 50-50 shot of having the book in our hands next summer-- but probably more like August than the usual June or July release dates. This would be followed by maybe a 30% chance of pre-Christmas 2007, with the remaining probability assigned to "spring or summer 2008" (I'm not sure how a Spring release would work; if she finishes the manuscript in September 2007 or so, a Christmas release would be too soon, but the following June would be an awfully long time for the publishers to let that extra cash sit in our pockets).

We'll see what JKR has in store for us. (A title announcement would be nice, though! ...Surely it's got to be better than my suggestion of "Harry Potter and the Great Horcrux Hunt," or "GHH" for short.) :-)

Misnomer of the Month: "Wisdom Teeth"

2006-08-07T02:47:39Z

(Okay, yeah, I know they're called that for a reason. Still, at the moment it feels like "painful useless nuisance teeth" would be more apt.)

This past Friday I had the experience of having my wisdom teeth removed. And so this entry is for the benefit of anyone who might have to go through that in the future, and who might want to know what to expect.

From what the oral surgeon told me, they normally prefer to remove wisdom teeth when the patient is younger than I am. The older one gets (I'm now 38), the more difficult it becomes. But in my case, I'd kept them until now, but this spring my dentist tried to do a filling on one of them, and found that it was a more difficult job than expected, and so put in a temporary filling instead and gave me a recommendation to go see the oral surgeon to finish the job.

I actually only had two days of knowing that the operation was coming up this soon. I saw the oral surgeon for introductory x-rays on Wednesday, and then his staff told me they had an opening for me to come in on Friday. "Okay," I thought (bracing myself a bit), "might as well get it over with...."

And so there I was, at 11:00 on Friday morning, waiting to get anesthetized into unconsciousness and four teeth yanked. My mom had to drive me there, since I was going to be in no condition to drive myself home. They also required that I have nothing to eat or drink in the morning before coming in. (And I haven't been able to enjoy a meal since; but I'll get to that later.)

The staff told me that the procedure was expected to take 30 to 45 minutes. It was about 11:45 by the time the doctor stuck the anesthetic needle inside my left elbow (I made a point of not looking at it, lest the sight cause me to involuntarily tense up and harm myself).

And then, the next thing I knew, it was 1:15 in the afternoon. I scribbled down a question for the doctor (being in no condition to talk), asking him whether it had been more difficult than expected. It turned out that one of my lower wisdom teeth had to be broken apart from the jawbone, or something like that, which is what took the extra time. (Mine certainly isn't the worst case that's been seen; but it wasn't quite as benign as it might have been, either.)

The rest of Friday was very painful, in spite of the strong painkiller I was prescribed. My parents kindly let me spend the rest of the day at their house, and also spend the night in my old bedroom. It wasn't easy to sleep, partly because the painkiller was a bit rough on my stomach.

Saturday (the second day) I felt a lot better-- the pain wasn't gone, but it was manageable with ordinary Advil, and I was able to go home in the morning. (I also have to keep taking antibiotics, to help make sure infection doesn't set in.) In fact, I probably tried to do too much-- in the evening I went out to a church-related meeting, and also tried to eat a Jack-in-the-Box cheeseburger with a spoon, which was probably more chewing and talking than my mouth was ready for.

Today I went to church in the morning, and was able to teach my Sunday school class as usual, but haven't tried to do much more than that. And so here I sit, eating spoonfuls of tapioca pudding (since it hurts to chew anything, and using a straw would apparently be even worse), hoping I can get back to normal within the next couple days or so.

If anyone else is going to have to go through this soon-- my best wishes to you, for as mild a procedure as can be hoped for in the circumstances!

Another Fandom Anniversary, Sort Of

2006-07-31T05:57:05Z

In addition to being the birthday of one of my favorite characters, Neville Longbottom, today is also a bit of a fandom anniversary. Unfortunately, it’s not a terribly happy one. Five years ago today was my most extensive post in my least successful thread ever at SQ: “Through JKR’s Glasses.” (The thread is of course unavailable, as the old SQ EZBoard no longer exists as far as I know, and that thread had dropped off the boards before the website transfer anyway. The starting date of the thread was some unknown date in late July; I only know July 30 because I still have a document file, saved on that date, of a later post I wrote replying to several people.)

The Original Thread

The background to my original post was not, interestingly enough, a ship debate. It was only later that my literary theorizing was put to service in the shipping wars, as that environment tended to become a magnet for every misguided and misapplied theory that people could twist to their preferred ends. But this, my original foray into the world of literary theory, was prompted (if I recall correctly) by arguments over the moral qualities of Sirius Black.

Specifically, what I was noticing was that some people were starting to judge Sirius as they would a real-life person: “Sirius did such-and-such, so he’s a bad person” (stated in a more refined manner, of course, but the idea was something along those lines). This seemed to reflect a bit of a disconnect with JKR’s own presentation of Sirius; she seemed, rather, to view him as a character who was flawed in various ways, and who had done one particularly horrible thing at age sixteen, but who in spite of all that was ultimately a good guy.

Note to anyone wishing to jump in to the comments and argue about Sirius: Please don’t. That’s not my point here, okay?

Now, a disagreement with JKR’s moral presentation of characters and actions in the story wouldn’t by itself have prompted me to raise theoretical objections. I myself disagree with JKR’s moral implications on quite a few points, though not enough to spoil the story for me. Rather, my objection was to the practice of leaving the author out of the picture entirely. And so my primary point in the original post of the “Through JKR’s Glasses” thread was that saying “this person is presented as a bad character,” and saying “this person is presented as a good character, but I disagree with the author’s moral judgment on that point” are two entirely different statements, and that to fail to distinguish them would add unnecessary confusion to the discussion.

Big mistake. The thread drew the attention of, it seemed, everybody that opposed my position, and was largely a bore to anyone who generally shared my perspective. You must understand, of course, that at the time I knew nothing of literary theory, and of how overwhelmingly it opposes the idea of paying attention to the author. I was, of course, informed of this quite thoroughly, quite shortly. (In typing the previous sentence, I was tempted to say “…was shortly informed of this in no uncertain terms”; but that would have been incorrect, as more than a few of the terms involved were quite uncertain indeed. More on this in a few more paragraphs.)

Although several people jumped in to oppose me on the thread (most of them missing my point entirely), there were two highly-educated people in particular who went back and forth with me several times. One of these was more moderate about it, coming from the perspective of the “New Criticism” (as it was called in the mid-20th century, when it actually was new), which defines the meaning of a literary work as that which could be known about it from only the published text; I ended up parting company with her on, as far as I know, reasonably polite terms. The other was more extreme, coming from a Deconstructionist point of view, which denies the possibility of any stable literary meaning at all. So the thread ended up forcing me to debate, unaided, ideas of which I’d never heard before, which seemed off the wall but which were complex enough that it wasn’t easy to determine what was “wrong” with them. It was not a pleasant experience, and left me wishing I’d never brought up the subject in the first place.

(I should clarify that “unaided” refers only to the substantive debate itself. Shortly after I finally thought I had figured out the source of the misunderstanding—basically, that we were using different meanings of “meaning”—the Deconstructionist apparently wrote something snarky in reply, or at least snarky enough to get zsenya and arabellasq to jump in to defend me, and to send me emails apologizing for the fact that I’d been treated like that on their boards. The Deconstructionist abandoned the SQ boards shortly thereafter.)

The Aftermath: I. In Pursuit of Literary Theory

So after this, I did some reading up on literary theory, trying to figure out where all these crazy ideas were coming from. I found that there were various ideas in circulation, with my own perspective being the only one that wasn’t considered acceptable by much of anybody in the field. (This didn’t faze me; my perspective on present-day classical-music composition is in a similar position of unique disfavor among reputable scholars. So I’ve been there before.)

One of the views I’d encountered on the SQ thread, the “New Criticism,” was (it seemed from the reading I did) viewed as somewhat dated and out of favor. I did have some sympathy with that view: I at least agreed with them that some form of objective knowledge is possible, and, given that their ideas were developed in an era when it was common for critics to go overboard on the supposed significance of biographical details about the authors, I could sympathize with their desire to focus on the text itself. However, I could not agree with their view that it was somehow inherently “fallacious” to consider extra-textual information about a literary work (I was tempted to call this view “The ‘Intentional Fallacy’ Fallacy”). But still, I considered my disagreement with them to be only a literary one (making differing choices about what questions to try to answer about the literary work), rather than a philosophical one.

The views that seemed to be more current were “Reader-Response Criticism” and Deconstruction, both of which deny the possibility of objective literary meaning. (Reader-Response seems to define literary meaning as whatever a community of readers makes it; Deconstruction seems to define it as an endless interplay of ideas suggested by the text, or something like that. I speak with uncertainty here, especially about Deconstruction, not only because I’m describing ideas with which I have little sympathy and which are based on philosophical positions with which I strongly disagree, but also because the theorists of Deconstruction seem to use their essays to illustrate their points about the impossibility of establishing a clear meaning of a text.)

(Some sources suggest that even Deconstruction is a bit dated. Apparently the more recent ideas are post-colonial and similar approaches, which seem to presuppose a neo-Marxist view of the world. I found these of little interest; among other things, they have the effect of making literature a sub-discipline of political philosophy.)

Eventually, I came across an interesting (and, amazingly, a readable) little book titled Against Theory. This is a collection of a series of essays from various literary perspectives, published in the early 1980’s, arguing over their respective concepts of “literary meaning.” I was interested to see that the authors of the title essay (Benn and Michaels), although they attempted to distinguish their position from the classical view which I hold, and although their reputation put them in the “Reader-Response” camp, didn’t really disagree with me on any point of substance. However, in making my way through the essays in the series (including Benn and Michaels’ later reply to their critics), I began to notice that what was happening is that everyone was using a different definition of “meaning,” and then criticizing everyone else for not using the term the same way they did. (As far as I could tell, only one of the authors—I think he was a Deconstructionist—even recognized that a disconnect of terms was going on, and even he didn’t seem to realize it very well.) And so I concluded: “Hey, wait a minute—these people are university professors, and they can’t even recognize the point on which they’re talking past each other.” It was at about that point that I began to lose interest in capital-T Theory, deciding that it wasn’t really going to add much to my understanding of anything. (It was also about then, if I recall correctly, that I thought up the phrase “The Definition Fallacy”.)

The Aftermath: II. Theory and Fandom

In some ways I regretted having delved into the subject at all. But the awareness of the issues did come in handy a few times. The first instance of this was about a month after the original thread, when some people decided to come over to SQ to debate ship, and one of them used a really shallow version of philosophical relativism in support of his position: something like “You’re not JKR, so you have no way of knowing what JKR meant by what she said.” I replied that “by that logic, language is meaningless and communication is impossible, since whatever anybody says about anything, we’ll never be able to know what they meant by it. So, in that case, I guess all I have to say is: Ahorpae ofa rgioa aoiarejho aroih a aroegia rhogneia? ahp ota rghoih ruhguiaze r hh gf afhgld fdklah.” (Or words to that effect.)

(Incidentally, it’s been suggested by some that that post of mine may have been the origin of random typing in the SQ collective vocabulary. This may be true—it did seem to be shortly after that incident that the Professors started doing that—but I had always assumed that the Professors had developed that habit of independently of me. In particular, they used random typing to indicate laughter, while I used it to make a philosophical point. I’d be honored if I did turn out to be the originator, but am guessing probably not. However, if anyone knows for sure, either way, I’d be interested to hear it.)

It was also at least partly as a result of those thought processes that I began to become aware of conflicting definitions of terms, used without awareness of the conflict (“Definition Fallacies”) as a common source of misunderstanding in discussions. In particular, this led me to coin the phrases “Canonical Shipping” and “Preferential Shipping,” which I think helped some of the “Preferential”-type H/H shippers to get along better with Quillers (and perhaps vice versa), realizing that we and they weren’t really necessarily disagreeing, we just had different tastes.

But, on the negative side, the thread did sort of mark the beginning of my “hitting the wall” at the Quill, running into the limits of my ability to elevate the intellectual quality of the discussions. The core old-school Quillers were, in general, pretty good about distinguishing their own perspectives from JKR’s when the two didn’t match. But most of them were less conscious of the issue than I was, and (probably to their credit) less bothered by it when people started mixing personal and canonical perspectives in the threads. And so, as the community grew, threads that frustrated me became increasingly common. (I should emphasize that I don’t think being able to remain unbothered by the sort of ideas that frustrate me makes you an unworthy person. If anything, it makes you a better person than I am! But though the frustration is not an ideal thing to have, it is there, and eventually I had to back off a bit from things.)

Conclusion: An Attempted Clarification of My Views on Literature

So anyway—after the various interactions with fandom people and scholarly texts—my view of literature is more or less as follows:

1. I believe that, although we humans are imperfect in our reasoning, so that there’s no absolute and final way of verifying that we haven’t made a mistake on something, nevertheless reasonably stable knowledge is possible. As we learn more about something, we have more and more of a basis for reaching a conclusion, until finally we can say it’s “beyond a reasonable doubt.” Of course “beyond reasonable doubt” claims are only as good as the person making them is reasonable; but still, reasonable conclusions are possible, and I’ve never met anybody who lived as thought they weren’t. (This was the point of my random-typing argument in August 2001.)

2. There are, however, various purposes with which one may approach literature. One may read to understand the author’s intended implications, or to understand the psychological reasons that make such a story appeal to its readers, or to give a perspective from a given religious or political standpoint, or various other possibilities. This choice of how to read is essentially arbitrary, and can’t really be proven right or wrong. (If a person says “I think it’s sweet when Harry and Hermione ride the Hippogriff together, and I don’t care what JKR meant by it,” there’s nothing actually incorrect about that; but if a person said, “I think JKR plans for Harry and Hermione to become a romantic couple,” that’s a different story.)

3. It is important to make sure that the assumptions brought to one’s discussion of literature match the question one is trying to answer. Some of the prevailing literary theories (the “New Criticism” in particular) seem to have been developed primarily for the study of poetry, in which ambiguity and multiple possible meanings are often part of how the poem is intended to work. But a theory that works well with poetry may not work so well with a novel—and especially not when the novel is a multi-part mystery in progress, of which only the author knows the ending, and of which the author has revealed carefully selected hints to interested readers outside of the published text. (In particular, if you’re trying to figure out how a story in progress is going to end, rejecting authorial statements as a source of information is quite counterproductive indeed.)

4. I still believe that clear discussion is best supported by a careful distinguishing of personal from authorial perspectives—especially, by distinguishing “I think this is good/bad” from “The author is presenting this as good/bad.” But I suppose it’s a bit much to expect everybody to be able to recognize that distinction.

(“5.” I recognize the possibility that this LJ thread might spin out of control, just like the original one on SQ did five years ago. So it might be best not to post anything here that you want to keep, unless you’ve saved it someplace else. This post’s permanent existence is not guaranteed!)

One Year Down

2006-07-17T05:59:05Z

Today marks one year since the release of HBP. Let me then mark the occasion with a few comments, in three categories:

(1) The Book, In Retrospect

At the time I commented: "Wow, what a book. Not always what I expected; but, I would say, the best installment since PoA." I still hold that view ("best since PoA"), of course-- OotP, while certainly filling an important role in the overall series, is not really the type of story that JKR is best at; and, while GoF and HBP are somewhat comparable in various ways, I think that HBP holds together better and is more satisfying (when viewed as an individual installment, at least).

PoA still stands out, chiefly on the strength of its amazing final-adventure sequence (with the MWPP revelations, the Time-Turner episode, and the culminating realization: "Prongs"). The more interesting question to me is whether I like HBP better than CoS. It's a tough comparison to make; HBP is about twice the length, which has a big impact on how a story fits together. Sometimes I'm tempted to say CoS is better, but that's probably when I'm being biased more toward short and compact stories. It's probably best to say that I like them both about equally-- "Each in its own way" (as Beethoven said when asked which of his string quartets he thought was best).

One interesting facet of HBP-- which I don't think I've mentioned here before-- is the effect that the Dumbledore's Pensieve excursions have on the overall flow of the book. GoF has, to this point, the strongest peaks-and-valleys type of storyline, with repeated buildups to the three Tasks (and the QWC and Yule Ball also serving as peaks with buildups of their own). PoA is somewhat the same way (the peaks being the three Quidditch matches, supported by Harry learning the Patronus as preparation after the Grim Defeat by Cedric and Hufflepuff). PS and CoS are more "linear" in the sense of being a more straightforward buildup to the ending, without any big sub-adventures along the way. OotP is also kind of like that, but on a much larger scale; JKR did well with it, but it's really hard to make that sort of plot work in an 870-page book.

HBP is similar to the PoA/GoF type of plot, but in a different way. Its recurring feature (like the Quidditch in PoA and the Tasks in GoF) is not a set of intense peaks in the plot, but a set of excursions, the trips into the past with Dumbledore to learn about Voldemort's background and how he came to set up his Horcruxes. Instead of giving a peaks-and-valleys feel to the narrative, it's more like we go off to the side every three chapters or so (10, 13, 17, 20, and 23), and then come back to "real life"-- except that the excursions of course turn out to have the greatest importance in the overall scheme. I'm not sure I can explain it better than that; but I really do like the effect it gives.

One interesting feature of HBP was that the "Final Adventure" sequence (starting with Dumbledore asking Harry to come to the Cave) was shorter than the corresponding sequences in OotP, GoF, and perhaps even PoA. This I think I liked less well; it kind of made the ending feel cut-off (specifically, cut off by the death of Dumbledore-- or at least that was where the feeling set in). I could still reconsider that opinion, but for now it still kind of feels like "too short" of a climax for that long of a book. (I still like the book very much, of course; just that I view that as possibly a weakness in its structure.)

(By the way: I still think I got this post right. I got a lot of the details wrong, of course; but I still like my prediction for the general tone.)

(2) The Fandom Since HBP

I don't have as much to say here, but I did want to comment on the idea of a "Platinum Age" of the fandom (floated most notably by arabellasq in the wake of HBP). I don't think it's really turned out that way, or at least not for those of us who were at SQ in the "Golden Age." It may be different for those who are newer to the fandom, or who enjoy the debate-society atmosphere more than I do. But for me, at least, it's not really even a "Silver Age"-- that was the PoA-to-GoF era.

So this is more of a personal perspective, rather than an objective assessment of how things must be. Some will agree with me more, and some less (though, unfortunately, the ones who agree with me more are probably less likely to be reading this!). To some extent, my lack of enthusiasm for fandom these days is a matter of the series not being fresh to me anymore, and perhaps it's partly that we know pretty much where things are going, and so there's not as much room for exploration by fanfic (at least not the type that explore where canon might go, which was the kind I usually most liked).

But it's also that the fandom has shifted away from being a group that shares my mindset. The groups that I was most comfortable with (UHPFC in late 1999-early 2000, and SQ in 2001 and early 2002) tended to be relatively small, or at least with a small core of intelligent commenters who kind of steered the discussions-- with the core sharing more than the usual amount of my perspective, not only on what was correct and incorrect, but also on what was established and what was speculative. Not only that, but the cores tended to be at least approximately compatible with my approach of interpreting the series "through JKR's glasses," and toward keeping our own preferred social views mostly in the background. Also, I tend to dislike the Deathmatch-type debate environment; if somebody can't see what seem to me relatively basic things about the books, I'd rather not discuss the books with them at all. And I suspect that I have much stricter views than most about what constitutes "proof," what constitutes a "realistic possibility," and what's best left in the "conspiracy theory" bin.

It may be that my preferred discussion approach leaves limited room for discussion, and that once a group has been together for a while, we'll naturally run out of things too talk about (unless we like speculative theories or fanfic that's more removed from canon). After all, the HP books may be multi-faceted, but they're not inexhaustibly so. And I'd rather enjoy some discussions for a short time, and then bid everyone a polite farewell, rather than try and stay in discussions that I don't like. (I did the latter in the last six months before OotP, somewhat to my regret-- but I really wanted to stay in touch with fandom people through the book release. I'm not sure that it worked well.)

So I'm not lamenting the passing of the previous Ages of the fandom-- just observing that this hasn't been a particularly special one for me (nor, I suspect, for most other early Quillers; or at least several of them don't seem to be around much more than I am). It's not a tragedy; it's just Life.

(3) Looking Ahead to Book 7

And now I get to (hopefully) the most interesting part. :-)

Recall my remarks above about the "peaks" in the PoA and (especially) GoF plots, and the partly-similar "excursions" in HBP. In the case of Book 7 (or, as I'm preferring to call it until JKR tells us otherwise, "GHH"-- which, of course, is short for Harry Potter and the Great Horcrux Hunt), we already know pretty much what the plot structure is going to be. Specifically, we know that the plot is going to be built around Harry going after the four remaining Horcruxes, and then going for the Big Final Smackdown with Voldemort.

This seems quite likely to give "GHH" a structure more similar to GoF than to any other previous installment. There can of course be variations; JKR can certainly stick in an extra adventure not directly related to a Horcrux pursuit, or she can have Harry find two of them back-to-back (or-- and this seems reasonably likely-- to have Harry go after Nagini and Voldemort on the same trip). She can also have one of Harry's trips be a false positive (kind of like the Cave adventure in HBP; in fact, it would almost surprise me if there werent' at least one mistaken Horcrux pursuit at some point in GHH). But still, the basic structure will remain (as it does in GoF even though JKR threw in the QWC and YB alongside the Tasks).

In addition to this, there will need to be a lot of work to figure out where the Horcruxes are; and there will presumably be various other supporting subplots to resolve as well. So a lot of stuff has to happen. In particular, more stuff has to happen in the summer than before-- the B/F wedding, the Godric's Hollow visit (by the way, I used to think that GH was a village, but am coming to the view that it was more likely a hiding place for Gryffindors in hard times, or something like that), the Privet Drive visit, possibly the first Horcrux pursuit, and (I suspect) a visit from Lupin & Tonks or McGonagall or somebody convincing Harry to come back to school (which I expect that he will). So I could see this being the longest Summer section yet; and I don't see the school-year section being any shorter than GoF.

Now, the key element of a book's length is the word count; the chapter and page counts largely follow from that (as well as the weight of the hardcover edition, etc.). The previous three books ran 191K words (GoF), 255K (OotP), and 174K (HBP). For this one, I'm guessing:

Word Count: 220,000.

That is, I expect it to be clearly longer than GoF. I don't know if it will exceed OotP; it's possible (especially given the way JKR commented in her journal about things expanding), but that's an extreme enough result that I'm not going to jump to a prediction of it. 220K seems fairly safe and reasonable.

US Page Count: 800.

Again, about halfway between GoF and OotP. That's down to a publisher decision about fonts and margins and so forth; the back pages of the US editions say that they used 11.5-point Garamond for OotP and 12-point for the others. Clearly there's some point at which they start taking steps to increase the page density; since I'm guessing a word count halfway in between GoF and OotP, I'm guessing the publishers will split the difference in page density too (11.75-point Garamond?).

Chapter Count: 39.

I can, however, see the chapter count this time exceeding OotP's. OotP was notable for its big long chapters (about 6700 words a chapter; GoF was about 5200, HBP about 5800). The thing with OotP is that there's not that many big definite events to make the chapters divide, so they can expand almost indefinitely, constrained only by JKR's feeling that "this is too long for one chapter." GHH (or Book 7, to use its more normal designation) seems likely to be somewhere in the GoF-HBP range on average chapter length. (I could just have easily have said "40 chapters," even, but am not feeling quite that bold today!)

Release Date: 7/7/07 (?)

I expect JKR to finish the manuscript late this year, with a summer 2007 release. I don't know what the publishers will think about coming out a week before the 7/13/07 movie; but still, 7/7/07 seems like it would be too good to pass up if JKR gave them the book in anywhere near the right time range for it.

A Few Things I Expect to Happen

Kind of shotgunning here, but....

Summer
Chapters 1-2. The Wedding
Chapters 3-4. The Godric's Hollow visit. (Maybe they'll find a Horcrux there? Nah, seems a bit early in the book for that.)
Chapter 5. (Time passes-- kind of like the Phlegm chapter in HBP, only not as relaxed.)
Chapters 6-8. The Privet Drive visit (on July 30, with Death Eaters attacking at midnight as Harry's protection expires).
Chapters 9-11. Maybe the first Horcrux pursuit? Maybe they realize that RAB's Locket was at Grimmauld Place, but find that Mundungus has already sold it, and have to go and buy it off of Borgin & Burkes before the Death Eaters do?
Chapters 12. Return to Hogwarts (including somebody convincing Harry to do so).

School Year
Chapters 13-14. Beginning of the new school year, including new DADA teacher.
Chapters 15-17. Early school year stuff, and Horcrux research.
Chapter 18. Pursuit of second Horcrux (about November), perhaps during first Quidditch match (Ginny is new Captain).
Chapter 19. December of school year.
Chapter 20. Christmas break.
Chapters 21-22. January and a bit of February. More preparations.
Chapter 23. Attempted Horcrux pursuit during February Quidditch-- false alarm.
Chapter 24. More research...
Chapter 25. Somehow get out of school, get real third Horcrux.
Chapters 26-28. Latter parts of school year, plans for facing Nagini and Voldemort.
Chapter 29. Spring Quidditch; find Nagini separated from LV, talk her out of hosting a Horcrux. ("Dangerous to confide a Horcrux to something that can move and think for itself," Dumbledore says.)
Chapter 30. NEWT's.

Final Adventure
Chapter 31-37. Pursuit of Voldemort.
Chapter 38. Final Smackdown. Death of Voldemort, in the locked room at the Ministry.
Chapter 39. Epilogue, years later. H/G and R/H married, H/G with their first child; looks like Harry, with his (mother's) eyes-- but with one difference: "He doesn't have a scar."

Lesson Learned

2006-06-30T08:37:05Z

Presumably somebody has pointed this out somewhere before; but this week I noticed an amusing apparent example of "Lessons Harry Learned Between OotP and HBP":

"And it might have been a good idea to mention how ugly you think I am, too," Hermione added as an afterthought.

"But I don't think you're ugly," said Harry, bemused.

(OotP, ch. 26)

"I suppose I'm just going to have to accept that [Bill] really is going to marry [Fleur]," sighed Ginny later that evening, as she, Harry, Ron, and Hermione sat beside the open window of the Gryffindor common room, looking over the twilit grounds.

"She's not that bad," said Harry. "Ugly, though," he added hastily, as Ginny raised her eyebrows, and she let out a reluctant giggle.

(HBP, ch. 30)

The Body Count

2006-06-29T05:25:37Z

I don't have anything particularly profound to say about the characters JKR has recently moved back and forth across the "will/won't survive" line for Book VII. This is because all I really think we can say is that the characters in question are secondary, along the lines of Neville, Luna, Weasleys-older-than-Ron, Hagrid, Lupin, Tonks, and maybe McGonagall-- important enough that we'll care about what happens to them, but not so important that their destiny has to have been long since fixed in JKR's mind (which I take to be the case with Harry, Ginny, Ron, Hermione, Voldemort, and probably Snape). I can't see anything that would make any of the secondary characters drastically more likely than the others to have been newly sentenced or reprieved.

I was, however, interested to see both peachespig's recent thread on "which deaths do we care about," as well as the USA Today forecasts by melissa_tlc and Emerson as to the likelihoods of various character deaths. My own oddsmaking runs as follows:

Harry: 2% chance of death (Emerson says 30%, Melissa 20%)

From my perspective, it looks like M&E are being way pessimistic here ("we pray she's not that cruel," says Melissa). I agree that it's a tangible possibility that we could lose Harry, but everything I see in the way JKR is writing the series tells me that she's not writing a tragedy. She wants to scare us, and she wants the story to make sense in a realistic way. But still-- the story is most itself when things are turning out right on the central points (hence OotP being the most uncharacteristic of all the HP books), and I can't see it not ending basically happily (though it will certainly have some bittersweetness to it). And furthermore... everytime JKR talks about whether Harry will die, it comes across like she has to keep it an open question for the sake of the suspense, but she doesn't really mean for us to expect to lose him.

Ginny: 3%

Not much more likely than Harry. Her fate is too closely tied to his; and the beginnings of their romance in HBP would have a hard time making sense if she were to end up dead.

Ron: 5% (Emerson 10%, Melissa 12%)
Hermione: 6% (Emerson 10%, Melissa 6%)

I can more easily see Ron and/or Hermione dying than Harry and/or Ginny, but not by much. As with H/G, their storyline seems pretty definitely to point to a Future.

Arthur, Molly, Fred, George, Lupin, Tonks, Hagrid, McGonagall, Neville, Luna: 35% each (Emerson says 0% for McGonagall, Melissa 40%)

Here the question is mostly "how many of them will die?" By listing 10 of them and giving them 35% each, I'm implicitly expecting to lose about three or four of them. I don't see too much to distinguish one from the others; they're all in the "important, but secondary" category. None of them would destroy the story by dying. Lupin and Tonks might be a little bit more likely to live, to fulfill their end-of-HBP romance; but I don't see that as being nearly as certain as the much more central H/G. (So maybe drop them to 25% or so.) As I remarked on peachespig's thread, I see Molly as the one from this group whose loss would hurt Harry the most; but I don't see her as being more likely than the others to survive.

In particular, I must respectfully disagre with Emerson's "wouldn't accomplish anything" rationale for 0% on Minerva. Cedric was far less significant to the plot than the new Headmistress, and his death played a definite role in the story. And furthermore, part of JKR's point about Voldemort is that he will kill even if it doesn't mean anything. Lots of people are going to end up dead in this book, and not all of them will be characters to whom we're attached. (Though, sadly, some will.)

Percy: 45%

Percy, on the other hand, is certainly distinct from the mass of good, supporting characters. Will he have the chance to reconcile with his family? I hope so; but then again, I hoped so with Sirius and Snape before OotP too. I could quite easily see him dying, either unreconciled or (more hopefully) repentant at the last minute, leaving Fred, George, and Ginny to come to terms with his memory after he's gone.

Snape: 60% (Emerson says 30%, Melissa 50%)

Flip a coin, more or less-- I think he's slightly more likely to die than live, but it could really go either way. JKR certainly has some plot twist remaining with him, and I think he'll turn away from Voldemort before the end, perhaps providing the key for Harry's final victory. But I don't, at this point, expect him to live to see the post-Voldemort world.

(What I'd really like to know is: Is his life-debt to James still significant? I can't see his counteracting Quirrell's curse in PS/SS as having ended it. But there's been no mention of it since.)

Draco: 75%

I expect Draco to be dead early in Book 7. I can't see Voldemort tolerating a Death Eater who can't pull the trigger. But I expect his death will serve a purpose-- Harry knows that Draco was turning from the Dark Side when the Death Eaters barged in, and (though Ron will have a hard time seeing it) Draco will live alongside Cedric in Harry's memory, as a reminder of how cruel Voldemort is.

This could go either way, of course; but I think his death is significantly more likely than his survival.

Pettigrew: 85%

Can't see him living. The only question is how he'll repay the debt to Harry.

Voldemort: 99.9% (E&M both round it off to 100%)

Techically it's possible that he could live; but does anyone seriously expect it?

Alternative predictions from readers welcome....

Concert Report

2006-05-29T21:33:23Z

Saturday night was the concert I mentioned in my previous entry, and it went quite well. The String Quintet especially went well-- I had been a bit nervous beforehand, since I was still giving them advice and corrections through the last run-through before the performance, but then in the performance itself, they played almost everything just the way I wanted it. (It's supposed to be a smooth-sounding piece, and in all the rehearsals they kept making it too bouncy, but then in the performance they got it right.)

The "Lord of the Rings" songs were okay, although with a few mistakes (the girl playing cello in that one had been quite ill with a fever earlier in the week, and for that reason had missed the only full-length rehearsal of it that we were able to schedule). Still, I was generally happy with how it went (and besides, the Quintet was more important to me as a composer anyway; the LotR songs were just an extra bit thrown in for fun).

(The one "criticism" I received was from the dad of two of the performers [his son sang the LotR poems, and his daughter played first violin in both my pieces]; he pointed out that the tone of my "Sword that was Broken" [which also includes "All that is Gold"] was way too light for the exchange between Boromir and Bilbo at the Council. I could see his point, but am invoking the Handel's Messiah "All We Like Sheep" defense on that one.) :-)

Re. recordings: The performance was videotaped, and should be available in some digital format (perhaps .wmv or something). I hope to post a copy on music.pmcovert.com if possible, and if so will link from this journal when it becomes available.

Also, as a supplement to the Saturday program notes, I wrote an extra essay on "Modern Composers and Me," describing the path of classical music in the last sixty years or so, and my own relation (or non-relation) to it. It was somewhat along the lines of my long-ago LJ entry On Being a Retro-Classicist, although with a different emphasis. I'm not ready to post it online yet-- due to time and space constraints, I wasn't really able to work out exactly what I wanted to say-- but hope to do so eventually.

Music Announcement

2006-05-26T23:06:45Z

This weekend, for the first time, I get to hear a couple of my compositions performed in public. It's only a student performance, mind you; but still, it'll be a first-in-my-lifetime experience.

This started one evening back in February, at the rehearsal of the local youth orchestra for which I volunteer. After the rehearsal, the principal violist mentioned that she was organizing a chamber music concert series for her high school graduation project, and asked if she could hire me to write program notes for her concerts. I agreed, but then added, "Actually, you know.... Instead of paying me money, you could just play one of my pieces instead."

She said, "Yeah, we could do that." (Actually, she did end up paying me anyway; but having my works performed is definitely more significant than getting paid for writing essays.) So I decided to finish writing the first movement of my String Quintet in E Flat, and have her group play that in one of the concerts.

A few days later, she emailed me to let me know some of the pieces that they were doing, and who some of the other students participating in her project were (I knew several of them from the orchestra). It turned out that one of the guys from the cello section is also a baritone vocalist, and was singing "This Offer Is Unrepeatable" from the "Juliet Letters" project by Elvis Costello with the Brodsky Quartet. I replied, "Oh-- I didn't know he was a singer! I should give him a copy of my songs on 'Lord of the Rings' poems. (Well, not really... although I am quite fond of my version of 'The Cat and the Fiddle'....)"

She replied along the lines of, "Well, he does have a really great voice... And we're looking for more stuff for him to sing with us... And he is a bit of a Lord of the Rings fanatic...."

And so I ended up working out a version for voice and string quartet of my tunes for "Three Rings for the Elven-Kings," "The Cat and the Fiddle," "Seek for the Sword," and "Beside the Fire," and working out a tune for Gimli's "Song of Durin" and adding it to the set.

So it looks like it's actually working out. It should be fun.

(Note: If you'd like to hear what the Quintet sounds like [and don't mind General MIDI sound quality], click here.)

Attempted Transcription of JKR's OotP Chart

2006-03-10T07:23:01Z

Thanks to tartanboxers for posting screencap here (neither IE nor Firefox would let me grab the pen). In case anyone hasn't seen it already (although I'm sure somebody somewhere must have beaten me to it):

No	Time	Title	Plot	PROPHECY	Cho - Ginny	D.A.	O of P	Snape - Harry & father	Hagrid & Grawp
13	Oct	Plots and Resistance	Snape lesson - Harry skips to go [to Hogmeade]. Harry, Ron & Herm go to Hogsmeade, meet Lupin and Tonks - can't talk. Umbridge tailing - pass note. HRH recruiting for O of P. Hagrid fresh injuries.	Harry sees Hall of Prophecy Vol still formulating his plans. None of the DEs able to get in to Hall of P. Sends Snape on recc.(?) - his eyes.	Cho in Hogsmeade - wants to join O of P	Tonks & Lupin	recruiting	Harry skips lesson to recruit for O of P	Hagrid still being injured - blood stains - "he's feeding something that's not his blood"
14	Nov	The Order of the Phoenix	First meeting of the Order of the Phoenix		Cho & Ginny both present	Umbridge now reading mail	First meeting	Harry still skipping - Snape going(?)
15	Nov	The Dirtiest Tackle	Quidditch versus Malfoy. Harry suspended following attack on M after Cedric taunt - that night restless, unable to sleep following match - Umbridge etc. - Cho - concs(?) about scar - sees Nag attack Mr W	Nagini attacks Mr. W.	Cho now madly in love	Firehead.* *They can use firehead
16	Nov	Black Marks	Row re:skipping Snape lessons - Harry really in doghouse - he angry. Overview into Xmas. Herm contacts Rita -	Nagini got in, Vol has confirmation of Bode's story - only he & Harry can touch the prophecy	Cho kiss? Ginny - worried about father	Ron & rest of Ws called in to be told of father's injury	reactions - another meeting? overview	Row about Harry not going	Hagrid still getting injuries
17	Dec	Rita Returns	Snape lesson Hogsmeade / Xmas shopping / they meet Rita	Rita information 'Missy' slip kiss (?)	Harry now avoiding Cho a bit - Ginny & S.O. else ?		O of P	Another lesson	Hagrid hospital wing
18	Dec	St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries	St. Mungo's visit Xmas Eve - see Bode (Macnair visiting) see Lockhart see Mr. Weasley Neville	NOW VOL IS ACTIVELY TRYING TO GET HARRY TO H of P - very vivid - could see his name	Ginny & Dad	around
19	Dec	(Xmas)		Bode dead. Hall of P again.	Herm & Krum Ginny & boyf Ron girly mags(?)	Sirius here Big reunion
20	Jan	Extended Powers of Elvira Umbridge	Harry misses match v. Hufflepuff Order of Phoenix now suspected by Umbridge - why weren't they @ Snape lesson? match	[Harry fighting increasingly sharp visions but not very successfully]		[got to keep Sirius & Lupin going here]	O of P big meeting	Snape lesson H can mention H of Prophecy	Hagrid out of hospital now going into forest armed with spikes etc
21	Feb	(Valentines day)		with Cho. Hogsmeade - Trelawney out - Firenze replaces in nick of time. Rita reports back on Bode etc. Snape lesson?		Valentine date with Cho - v. miserable - they could row.	O of P		?
22	Feb	Cousin Grawp	Umbridge now really going for Hagrid - Firenze teaching Snape lessons? prophets & prophecies 7 HRH go to warn Hagrid of Umbridge - meet Grawp.					Snape going ape at Harry because he can't do it
23	March	(Treason)	Easter - discovery of O of P - Dumbledore takes the rap - Azkaban "Then to Azkaban I must go. I trust I'm allowed a toothbrush?"					Snape grudgingly approves (???)
24	April	(Careers Guidance)	Careers consultation - Auror. Order of Phoenix continues - Ginny has daubed on the wall in temper. Snape lesson	Harry starting to get it		firehead	see plot Meeting things hotting up w F&G		Hagrid clinging to job refusing to abandon Grawp

Reads best on full-screen view. Question marks, in most cases, indicate uncertainty on my part. (I have no idea what Snape "grudgingly approves.")

Definition Fallacies at the Olympics

2006-02-26T08:47:47Z

It is Winter Olympics time (or at least I assume they haven't done the closing ceremonies yet; which tells you how well I've been in touch with the games). And that means it's time for people to throw back and forth the usual arguments about "Is Figure Skating a Sport?"

In particular, two online sports columns recently caught my attention. One was by Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports, titled Why Figure Skating Is Not A Sport (which kind of tells you where he stands on the subject). The other was by Sally Jenkins of the Washington Post, titled Figure Skating Is A Cut Above The Frills, and taking the position that "Despite what some believe, figure skating is definitely a sport."

In cases like these, I naturally tend to sense the likely presence of a "definition fallacy," the topic of an early LJ essay of mine; I define it as "Incorrectly treating a word as if it meant the same to everyone else as it does to us." And so it was in this case.

Skating as a "Sport": Pro and Anti

The specific argument given by Jenkins in her column was to point to the athleticism involved in figure skating: "The blade of a figure skate is a quarter inch of steel, with sharpened edges. There. That's a quarter inch. Now let's see LeBron James land on it." The implicit definition she's using, then, is that a "sport" is a competition demanding a high degree of athletic skill. The thought that someone else might use the term differently doesn't seem to occur to her. In particular, she appears to be saying that to call figure skating "not a sport" is a denial of the skill and athleticism (and hard work and determination, and so forth) that are involved in it-- which is not true at all.

(In fairness to Jenkins, the opponents to whom she's responding are Mike Wilbon and Norman "The Couch Slouch" Chad; I'm not familiar with Wilbon's writing, but I've read some of Chad's, and I think it's safe to say that intellectualism is not really the point on which his columns are sold. So Jenkins may perhaps be forgiven for her failure to respond to an intelligent version of the opposing view.)

Wetzel comes off a little bit better in his column. For one thing, he does acknowledge the opposing position, and makes it clear that he's not disputing the degree of athletic accomplishment involved in figure skating. He also seems to realize that what's being disputed is a matter of definition: "But figure skating is a competition, not a sport, and it has nothing to do with how difficult or entertaining it is."

However, he stumbles a bit at the end, concluding about figure skating: "It can be fun to watch, the athletes can be talented and tenacious, it can be a great competition, but it isn't a sport. ...It just isn't." He wants to defend his definition of "sport" as an objectively scored athletic competition, but can't muster anything better than "It just isn't."

How to Resolve the Issue?

The simplest approach that Wetzel could have taken would have been to appeal to a dictionary. Unfortunately for him, however, this wouldn't have served his case very well, as the published definitions tend to define "sport" only in terms of athleticism and competitiveness (as Jenkins does)-- not requiring objectivity in scoring.

Is there no case to be made for Wetzel's position, then?

I think there is a partial case, although it doesn't go as far as he would like it to. First, I note that dictionaries speak as witnesses, not as judges-- the meaning of a word is not what the dictionary says it is, but what people in general mutually understand the term to mean. Dictionaries are very helpful in informing us about how the general public does use any given word, but not perfectly so-- they can miss nuances, they can be unaware of specialized usages, and they can take time to catch up with public usage.

Let us then ask: What is the general public's concept of a sport? Does it, or does it not, include events that are judged on artistic grounds?

Most of the time when we think of "sports," we are indeed thinking of events like baseball, football, and so forth, for which no style points are involved. Some schools do include gymnastics in their sports programs, but that's an exception to the usual rule, and-- as with figure skating-- most members of the general public only think of gymnastics as a "sport" for about two weeks out of every four years.

Probably from the general-public perspective, it is best to say that figure skating and gymnastics are included in the concept of a "sport," but are near the hazy boundary of it-- in the US, baseball, basketball, and (American) football are in the center (in the rest of the world it would be soccer). We might ask: If a ballet-dancing competition were held, with judges scoring the competitors on a scale of 10.0, would we call it a "sport"? I honestly don't know. The boundary of the concept seems to be somewhere right around there, I think.

Is Wetzel, then, merely applying a private definition and treating it as a public one? Not quite. Certainly he's not the only one who holds the objective-scoring concept of "sport." I expect that a substantial number of the people who spend the most time thinking and talking about sports would share his concept-- maybe even a majority. (I myself prefer to use the term "sport" as Wetzel does, although I wouldn't demand that the general public join me in doing so, as Wetzel in effect does.)

In this case, it seems probably fair to say that Wetzel is using a "specialist's definition," rather than the general public's. This is analogous to the term "hacker," in a context of software security. To the general public, a "hacker" is someone who breaks into computer systems illegally, generally for the purpose of causing harm. But to specialists in the field, a "hacker" is usually benign and often helpful, being simply a person who employs creative means to discover the inner workings of computer programs; such people refer to their malicious brethren as "crackers."

Summary

So then, it seems fair to say: Jenkins' position is correct by the general public's definition of "sport"; Wetzel's position is correct by a specialist's definition. Both columns would have been better-argued had they recognized more explicitly the definition issues involved.

(But in defense of both of them: They don't get paid to write well-constructed arguments, but to sell newspapers and to induce hits on websites-- goals which are probably better accomplished by reproducing in print the look and feel of the sort of argument one might have with one's friends in front of a television set after all parties involved have had a few more beers than are particularly good for them....)

Happy Birthday, Mozart!

2006-01-28T07:58:37Z

Hello, folks. Things have been quite busy here on three fronts-- work, church, and orchestra-- but I can't let the 250th birthday of my favorite composer pass without at least this small comment. A happy Mozart's birthday to you all!

(P.S. And, oh yeah... Go, Seahawks!) :-)

Early leader for "Worst Book Title of 2006"

2006-01-08T09:26:12Z

So, this afternoon I was in the local Barnes & Noble, and happened to glance across a table full of books in the (rather extensive) "For Dummies" series.

And, alongside such titles as Hypoglycemia for Dummies and Menopause for Dummies and a whole bunch more like them, there it was:

Athletic Scholarships for Dummies.

"Hey, now," I thought, "wait just a minute here...."

Happy Birthday, Sugarquill!

2006-01-06T02:54:59Z

January 2001

It was five years ago this week that I was surfing around the HP section of ff.net, and decided to read this one story that a lot of people I respected seemed to be recommending. The story was known by the odd title of "HQoW".

I noticed on the ff.net page of the author, somebody called arabellasq, that she was involved in a website called "sugarquill.com." On January 11th, 2001, I posted there on a thread titled "Is Draco EVIL?" I thus became about the twentieth member, and also the first who happened to be male (or so I concluded from the fact that zsenya replied, "Ooh-- a boy! a boy!"). And the rest is history.

A day or two later, in response to Zsenya's request that I post on their "Introductions" board, I did so under the thread title of "Hooray, I've found where the smart people are!" (as remembered by moeyknight here).

What Was Special About the Sugarquill

It must be understood at this point that I am not really a classic internet-fandom type of person. That is to say: The general tradition of Internet discussion boards tends to date back to the old Usenet, and is based (to an extent that I didn't originally realize) on the ideal of a public-square approach to the marketplace of ideas, such that in any debate that arises, all positions and arguments (more or less) are considered legitimate parts of the discussion, and it is expected that the most worthy ideas will prove themselves by standing up in that kind of open environment.

I have never favored that approach; and the more I think about it, the more I dislike it. I find that it tends to make discussions more incoherent, in several ways. First and foremost, people often thus end up trying to debate the interpretation of details when they have conflicting deeper-level assumptions that will naturally keep them from agreeing on the details. Also, it tends to result in more attention being paid to pungently-worded controversial statements, and less to thoughtful and balanced statements of one's position; it increases the number of ill-considered arguments being thrown at the opposing position (which annoys me even when I agree with the view being advanced, and more so when I disagree with it); and I suspect that it results in more attention being paid to high-profile controversial issues in general.

What I prefer instead is what we might call the "church-and-synagogue" approach: On the deeper-level issues that divide people, I consider it better to have separate communities, each dedicated to its chosen propositions. These communities can then discuss the more detailed issues within a framework that makes intelligent discussion possible; it's easier to discuss whether Draco is "EVIL," or just annoying, if you're not always being interrupted by people who'd like to tell you why he's the perfect guy for Hermione. Furthermore, on the communities' fundamental issues, the framework of general agreement allows an environment where the most intelligent statement of each community's position, and the strongest arguments for it, can bubble to the surface and be presented to the general public (as was the purpose of the "SQ Gringotts" essays) after suitable time for internal consideration. This decreases the likelihood of one's opponents "scoring points" by arguing against weaker versions of one's position.

What we found in the early days of SQ (somewhat surprisingly) was that, although the commitment to a pro-R/H view might seem like a "surface issue," it was (at least in 2001) a remarkably effective litmus test that produced a community with generally compatible views on most (not all, but most) issues surrounding the books (as lizzieluthor has remarked elsewhere). This is probably because it tended to select for the "deeper-issue" preference for trying to understand the books as JKR wrote them, and not for the ideas we could "find" in them by other means. For example, it was in the early days of SQ that a later printing of GoF reversed the order of James and Lily's shadows coming out of Voldemort's wand. As I recall, there was actually an article in USA Today that quoted some people from another fandom community who were upset about how JKR had undermined their theories. But nobody at SQ was upset about it at all; our reaction was pretty much just "oh, okay... yes, it does make more sense that way."

The Amazing First Year

In the first few months of the Quill, we continued to pick up a surprising number of like-minded HP fans, far surpassing Zsenya's and Arabella's original hopes for the site. As I have commented before, there is a sense in which SQ was a great idea "waiting to happen"; there were quite a few pro-R/H fans who were sort of waiting for a community to form that would allow the calm discussion of HP books from a perspective centered on canon rather than on speculation. But even so, Z and A were the right people to do it, and they came along at the right time. (As Moey remarked upon finding SQ: "I feel that I have finally come home.")

Furthermore, because of the strong core of intelligent and friendly adults in the community, many of our teenage members made remarkable progress in their ability to discuss the books intelligently. To be fair, a lot of them were pretty bright to begin with; but I still think they learned more and faster with us than they would have without us.

But the most amazing tribute to the strength of the SQ community was at the end of September 2001. That was when the SQ Professors went off on a camping trip for the weekend, and nobody else had moderation privileges at the time (oops). Now, a few days before this, Zsenya had instituted the rule that people weren't supposed to start (or otherwise attempt to create) H/H threads on the SQ boards. And no sooner had the Profs disappeared that Friday than a couple of young H/H shippers started trying to do just that. This drew some adverse reaction from other Quillers about the rule that was being flouted. Now, I tend to think that there's no point in having rules if they're not enforced; and so I decided to step in and exercise whatever purely informal authority might have come with the "Head Boy" title to do something about it. Specifically, I asked everyone to not respond to the H/Hers' comments, and to just let their threads naturally drop down the boards.

And the community held together with me on that. At the time it was a relief but not really a surprise. But in retrospect it positively amazes me. All it would have taken would have been one or two veteran Quillers saying, "Now, Doc, it seems like you're kind of over-reacting here, why don't we see if we can work something out with these folks," and the whole thing would have fallen apart. But having the Quill as a dedicated R/H (and not H/H) community was special enough to the members (of whom there were now hundreds [plural]) that everyone was willing to stand up for that principle.

At the end of the year, for the First Annual SQ Fanfic Challenge, I wrote my tribute to the Quill as a parody fic (also available with a few minor tweaks here). I suppose a good litmus test for a true "Olde SKEWL" Quiller is whether one gets the jokes in it.

(See also the sequel written the following summer, on the occasion of elanorgamgee1's West Coast mini-summit with jediboadicea. Also, see SQ: A History for a detailed review of the Quill's first two years.)

After the End... of the GoF Era

After the "GoF Era" ended with the release of OotP, the Sugarquill changed a bit, primarily due to the decreasing involvement of the Professors. Some would argue that the Quill kind of lost its way; perhaps even my own decreased involvement could be cited as evidence of that (for most of 2001 I was the second-leading poster on the boards, after Zsenya).

But I maintain that the Professors made the right choice in backing off from the fandom a bit after OotP. Again, it's the same underlying principle (deeper than mere R/H shipping) that made SQ hold together so well in the first place: We take the books as JKR makes them, and not as we might have wanted them to be. And OotP was not really a "fandom" sort of book-- one really can't (or, I'd at least say, shouldn't) read it and go on pretending that HP is just a fun little series to [Word that Cap'n Kathy Hates]* over.

Yes, of course SQ isn't the same as it was in the early days; but it couldn't have been, and shouldn't have been expected to be anyway.

*Concerning the Word that Cap'n Kathy Hates: Please see hyddenfromyou's explanation in the SQ Glossary. (Oh, and by the way, the Glossary also provided the original inspiration that led to my "ROXin' Adventure" fic.)

And so....

And so... a most Happy SQ Birthday to all Quillers; and especially those from the first year of it; and above all to zsenya, arabellasq, moeyknight, bbennett, elanorgamgee1, and jediboadicea. Many thanks for the memories.

Notes on JKR/Stephen Fry radio interview

2005-12-10T09:39:40Z

Didn't seem to be getting to sleep, so listened to JKR with Stephen Fry on BBC Radio4. Nothing big about book 7-- the only significant comment on it was what TLC had already posted. Sketchy notes follow.

SF: Which characters have some of you in them?
JKR: Especially Harry-- everything seen from HP’s POV. Little of JKR in all characters.

SF: Occur that so many who have never been in boarding school wd relate to particular world?
JKR: Never been there either. Essential for plot that children together overnight—adventure would fall down every other day. Also logical—where wd wizards educate their children? Also distance so Muggles wouldn’t come upon it. But natural for audience.

SF: Definition of successful fiction—create own world. Children & adults dream they’re there. Strange warning voices, arguing dangerous.
JKR: All part of that—young ladies 200 years ago not allowed to read novels. Distressed to read about Virginia Woolf being told not to write. CSL’s Wood Between Worlds metaphor for library. For JKR, what literature should be. Flattered to see SF drew parallel w/world of S Holmes. World that never existed, but believe it could have, and want it to have existed.

SF: Accused both of fantasy in which children can luxuriate (escapist), and of being frightening.
JKR: Move to sanitize literature—trying to protect children from imaginations. In US, 3 TV programs on how to explain to children that Halloween things aren’t real. Children who know dementors in fiction less likely to fall victim in real life.

SF: With Harry, extraord closeness to LV. Great deal of speculation…
JKR: Early was asked: LV HP’s father? No—SW.

SF: Frontrunning ending—defeat LV by losing powers.
JKR: “Good ending.” Wd be sued for plagiarism by 13M children!

SF: (??)
JKR: Have taken horrible liberties w/mythology, but no apologies. English mythology pieced together from many nations. No compunction about borrowing. (Hippogryffs.)

SF: Language, words, derivation. Hippogryffs: Greek/Latin “hippus,” Welsh “gryff.” Troll through OED?
JKR: Don’t really troll through books. Exception Gilderoy Lockhart. Had found “Lockhart” on war memorial, then “Gilderoy” in book.

SF: Wondered if own reading had altered writing….
JKR: While writing GoF, could hear Jessica playing CoS/PoA tapes.

SF: Phrasing, balance of sentence.
JKR: Love writing dialogue. When hear SF reading, whole new set of pleasures—never read aloud. Jessica wondered how you do Hermione’s voice.
SF: Always loved Scot comedian Stanley Baxton—deepened voice when speaking for a women. But sort of softening of voice. Also… Hissing must have sibiliant.

SF: Who was (literary) hero as a child?
JKR: Heroine of Little White Horse—plain, freckly, unlike beautiful heroines. E Nesbit—not very sentimental, quirky. Female writers less sentimental about childhood.
SF: Treasure island, e.g. JKR has written “boys’ adventure,” only with girls. Letters mostly from girls?
JKR: About 50%-- prob. parents encouraged to write! Esp. like letters from those who obviously aren’t comfortable writing.

SF: First edition of PS—illustration come up?
JKR: Publishers felt illusts wd aim at younger audience. US edition—small line drawings at beg of each ch. Not color plates. (But used to love color plates.)

SF: Published in US by Scholastic. 1st signing queue in US—woman in gilt.
JKR: Woman dressed as Fat Lady. Closest JKR will ever get to being a pop star. Screams, flash bulbs, didn’t know where was. When such events are over, have to shut down, return to office.

JKR to SF: Any character with whom you identify?
SF: Dumbledore, twinkling. Like Archbishop of Canterbury Ramsey, interviewed by Muggeridge—“you are a very wise man.” “Hmm, am I wise? What is wisdom? Ability to cope.” (Not how much know.) Time-worn quality that AD has. Can cope, wd almost rather not be able to.
JKR: Yes, burden.
SF: But also Harry—the one who undergoes all the tests. Always one whom weigh self against.
JKR: Boy interviewed about Harry—“doesn’t seem to underst what going on, nor do I.” Harry very human hero. Had to reach point of almost breaking down. OotP was point at which he would; now ‘rises from ashes.’ Burning sense of outrage—shouldn’t lose that, but adults do.

JKR to SF: All these characters—how find voices for all?
SF: Tonks—Jane (??) accent. Turn of phrase—some character sounds like a Cockney, etc.
JKR: Only Hagrid protective of, accent-wise. SF’s accents not intrusive.
SF: Aim for, to not get in way. When reading, sometimes not conscious of turning pages—should be same with reading on tape. Other problem pacing—need to refresh, but mustn’t overdo that either.

JKR to SF: Any scenes can particularly remember enjoying reading?
SF: Bowels of Ministry in OotP, building tension, strange glass orbs.
JKR: Some children say took it in better when SF read it. Prob. because after 3 years, read too fast!

SF: Really true that have all planned out?
JKR: Yes, do know what will happen. Cold shivers, panic, “obvious”—then “not that obvious.” Really skid off end of 6 into 7—not discrete adventure as previous. In 6, ending definitive in one sense, but feel that plot is not over this time. For first time, aware that am finishing.

SF: Write for children next time?
JKR: Don’t know. Another children’s book, mouldering in cupboard. Will need good pseudonym!