(no subject)
HBP thoughts round two. 'Ware spoilers.
Of course, all comments here are scattered, preliminary, and may well come from a gross misreading of the text. Written far too late last night.
I found the characterisation to be good, generally - Harry, as I’ve said, was absolutely dead-on, and I think that my favourite thing about him is that he is a hero that I can cheer for. Generally for me the hero takes second place to another character, in terms of interest and empathy, but personally - I love Harry, and I love the way he’s grown up. Even things like the Potions textbook - I wanted to slap him on the head, but I still felt for him.
Perhaps the last chapter has coloured my perception of the book, but I think that on the other hand I felt relatively cold about most of the other characters in the book. I still stand by my disappointment in Hermione, and - well, Ron, Ginny (let’s just say Weasleys ad nauseum), Draco, Slughorn, Narcissa, Neville, Hagrid…gah, who else is there? They generally left me pretty ambivalent. And that’s something that I’ve never felt while reading Harry Potter before.
There are a number of possible reasons for it. The first is, of course, my natural prejudices. I do find Ron short of redeeming qualities; I do find Draco formulaic and generally nasty. Then, perhaps I’m outgrowing the books, perhaps I didn’t engage with this one as deeply as the others because I do have a heap of other stresses and concerns. However. I enjoyed the Tom Riddle storyline, the trips down the pensieve, the piecing together of the mystery, and for me that’s what the book was all about. What I’m not sure about is whether the reason that all of the everyday stuff has faded into the background is because I’m more naturally interested in the lead-up to the final battle, or whether it is in JKR’s writing. And if it’s in her writing is it because it’s more important to the story, or because it’s more important to Harry?
I realise that that really makes no sense. It kind of does in my head, so I’m going to leave it for some other procrastination time.
…that said, I liked Luna. And I thought that the Remus/Tonks storyline was incredibly well handled. Completely plausible - and yes, I jumped to all the wrong speculations about what Tonks was up to, and so on. It was cleverly done, and of course Tonks would have a different perspective on transformations. The Bill/Fleur relationship was cute, if predictable.
Allright, so. Snape. Like I said, I want him to be bad. I don’t want him to be redeemed. See, for the past book, perhaps longer, I’ve been mad at Harry, I’ve been so frustrated with him for being so stubborn and not accepting that Snape's good. And so here I’ve read the second chapter and just thought ‘well, fuck’ - because I fell into the same trap of ceaseless stubbornness, believing that Snape was good because Dumbledore trusted him. And plot-wise, I find it much more interesting for Snape to be evil. Because he does have so many similarities with Voldemort, and I suppose I find the nuances in their different pathways the most interesting…but then, for a children’s book? I don’t know.
Oh, the uncertainty in Dumbledore’s voice just before Snape killed him! That got me. That really, really hurt.
I really don’t have anything to say about the horcrux storyline, just because it is incomplete and because, quite naturally, it feels like one half of a book. I found it interesting, however, that she did leave just the initials ‘R.A.B.’, because - and correct me if I’m wrong - I think that generally she’s been relatively explicit at the end of the books at least. On one hand, there is the obvious contender in Regulus, but then we can’t be positive until the last book comes out. I’d be interested to know if her decision there is anything to do with the fact of HP as such a pop culture phenomenon, and one that does invoke such speculation. But I’m tired and that sounds wanky, so let’s leave it there.
Umm, anything else?
For me, now, the key interest is trust. At the risk of sounding like a terribly inadequate Harry Potter fan, I can’t remember whether it’s in this series that hero and mentor (Harry and Dumbledore) spoke about the bad guy working alone, with the hero being surrounded by people (or, not in so many words). Because now Harry’s the relatively isolated one - yes, he has Ron and Hermione, but as the last interviews with McGonagall and Scrimgeour demonstrated, he doesn’t have anybody else. And I know that the OotP must have had contingency plans to survive the death of Dumbledore - because that’s just logical - but as the book left it, Harry is out of that loop, and so may well be Snape.
Okay, from another perspective, the Sorting Hat’s warnings about remaining united. It worries me that while Harry may trust Mr and Mrs Weasley, McGonagall, Remus, Hagrid, he can’t fully confide in them. And perhaps that, when it comes down to it, explains my biggest problem with HBP: the fact that Ron and Hermione were reduced to this kind of mating ritual that effectively took away their personalities and really divorced them from Harry (although there were other contributing factors for that as well). This really was Harry’s book, and I don’t know how Ron and Hermione can pick up the slack in the last.
It’s late and I’m pretty well done for. I haven’t had a chance to read many commentaries on it, and I’m only going to have limited net time in future, so if anybody can point me to any really good debates and analyses it would be appreciated. Sarah, Ro, Dani, Mandi - I’m typing this up offline, so if I don’t have time to reply to your posts, I can’t wait to dig into it with you guys.
Of course, all comments here are scattered, preliminary, and may well come from a gross misreading of the text. Written far too late last night.
I found the characterisation to be good, generally - Harry, as I’ve said, was absolutely dead-on, and I think that my favourite thing about him is that he is a hero that I can cheer for. Generally for me the hero takes second place to another character, in terms of interest and empathy, but personally - I love Harry, and I love the way he’s grown up. Even things like the Potions textbook - I wanted to slap him on the head, but I still felt for him.
Perhaps the last chapter has coloured my perception of the book, but I think that on the other hand I felt relatively cold about most of the other characters in the book. I still stand by my disappointment in Hermione, and - well, Ron, Ginny (let’s just say Weasleys ad nauseum), Draco, Slughorn, Narcissa, Neville, Hagrid…gah, who else is there? They generally left me pretty ambivalent. And that’s something that I’ve never felt while reading Harry Potter before.
There are a number of possible reasons for it. The first is, of course, my natural prejudices. I do find Ron short of redeeming qualities; I do find Draco formulaic and generally nasty. Then, perhaps I’m outgrowing the books, perhaps I didn’t engage with this one as deeply as the others because I do have a heap of other stresses and concerns. However. I enjoyed the Tom Riddle storyline, the trips down the pensieve, the piecing together of the mystery, and for me that’s what the book was all about. What I’m not sure about is whether the reason that all of the everyday stuff has faded into the background is because I’m more naturally interested in the lead-up to the final battle, or whether it is in JKR’s writing. And if it’s in her writing is it because it’s more important to the story, or because it’s more important to Harry?
I realise that that really makes no sense. It kind of does in my head, so I’m going to leave it for some other procrastination time.
…that said, I liked Luna. And I thought that the Remus/Tonks storyline was incredibly well handled. Completely plausible - and yes, I jumped to all the wrong speculations about what Tonks was up to, and so on. It was cleverly done, and of course Tonks would have a different perspective on transformations. The Bill/Fleur relationship was cute, if predictable.
Allright, so. Snape. Like I said, I want him to be bad. I don’t want him to be redeemed. See, for the past book, perhaps longer, I’ve been mad at Harry, I’ve been so frustrated with him for being so stubborn and not accepting that Snape's good. And so here I’ve read the second chapter and just thought ‘well, fuck’ - because I fell into the same trap of ceaseless stubbornness, believing that Snape was good because Dumbledore trusted him. And plot-wise, I find it much more interesting for Snape to be evil. Because he does have so many similarities with Voldemort, and I suppose I find the nuances in their different pathways the most interesting…but then, for a children’s book? I don’t know.
Oh, the uncertainty in Dumbledore’s voice just before Snape killed him! That got me. That really, really hurt.
I really don’t have anything to say about the horcrux storyline, just because it is incomplete and because, quite naturally, it feels like one half of a book. I found it interesting, however, that she did leave just the initials ‘R.A.B.’, because - and correct me if I’m wrong - I think that generally she’s been relatively explicit at the end of the books at least. On one hand, there is the obvious contender in Regulus, but then we can’t be positive until the last book comes out. I’d be interested to know if her decision there is anything to do with the fact of HP as such a pop culture phenomenon, and one that does invoke such speculation. But I’m tired and that sounds wanky, so let’s leave it there.
Umm, anything else?
For me, now, the key interest is trust. At the risk of sounding like a terribly inadequate Harry Potter fan, I can’t remember whether it’s in this series that hero and mentor (Harry and Dumbledore) spoke about the bad guy working alone, with the hero being surrounded by people (or, not in so many words). Because now Harry’s the relatively isolated one - yes, he has Ron and Hermione, but as the last interviews with McGonagall and Scrimgeour demonstrated, he doesn’t have anybody else. And I know that the OotP must have had contingency plans to survive the death of Dumbledore - because that’s just logical - but as the book left it, Harry is out of that loop, and so may well be Snape.
Okay, from another perspective, the Sorting Hat’s warnings about remaining united. It worries me that while Harry may trust Mr and Mrs Weasley, McGonagall, Remus, Hagrid, he can’t fully confide in them. And perhaps that, when it comes down to it, explains my biggest problem with HBP: the fact that Ron and Hermione were reduced to this kind of mating ritual that effectively took away their personalities and really divorced them from Harry (although there were other contributing factors for that as well). This really was Harry’s book, and I don’t know how Ron and Hermione can pick up the slack in the last.
It’s late and I’m pretty well done for. I haven’t had a chance to read many commentaries on it, and I’m only going to have limited net time in future, so if anybody can point me to any really good debates and analyses it would be appreciated. Sarah, Ro, Dani, Mandi - I’m typing this up offline, so if I don’t have time to reply to your posts, I can’t wait to dig into it with you guys.