The Pevensies at Hogwarts

I feel nigh unto certain that someone has written about this already, but have you ever noticed how neatly you could divvy up the Pevensie children in The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe into houses at Hogwarts?

I was not feeling terribly well last night and picked up my well-worn copy of LWW just to let myself dip into a few of its friendly and familiar pages. And right there, on page three, we have this exchange among the four children who have just landed at the Professors' house:

"It's an owl," said Peter. "This is going to be a wonderful place for birds. I shall go to bed now. I say, let's go and explore to-morrow. You might find anything in a place like this. Did you see those mountains as we came along? And the woods? There might be eagles. There might be stags. There'll be hawks."

"Badgers!" said Lucy.

"Snakes!" said Edmund.

"Foxes!" said Susan.

Laying aside the fun possibility that the owl they hear hooting outside is delivering mail, don't you find their animal choices somewhat fascinating? In the world of Harry Potter, the animals associated with people are always "telling" about someone's character -- whether they are the animals associated with their Hogwarts house, or with their patronuses or an animagus form.

Peter's enthusiasm gives us a lot of animals to choose from, but I find it interesting that he ends with stags and hawks. The reference to stags here at the beginning of the story could be a pre-echo of the end of the tale, but as I think of it in connection to Harry Potter, I think of course of Prongs. Hawks are birds associated with heraldry -- not to mention hawks rhymes with Fawkes. Put that all together with Peter's kingly courage and the gift of the sword from Father Christmas, and I'm going to say the Sorting Hat would put him in Gryffindor.

Lucy's badger puts her firmly in Hufflepuff, which I find delightful and just right. Her loyalty to the truth, her faithfulness to Aslan, and her perseverance in the face of trials all seem to make this Hogwarts house just the right place for her.

"Snakes!" said Edmund...which is where I almost started laughing. Slytherin, anyone? Edmund, pre-Narnia and especially pre-encounter-with-Aslan, seems to fit the scheming, ambitious, smart-yet-insecure portrait of many a Slytherin. Post-Aslan, of course, he's a different sort of boy, and one can imagine him having more trouble fitting into Slytherin after that (one thinks of Jill Pole noting how much Eustace has changed when he goes back to school after his adventures in Narnia) but perhaps he could bring qualities that house sorely needs.

Susan's mention of foxes is a little more ambiguous, though I do think that foxes, as very smart animals, make her a potentially good fit for Ravenclaw. It's too bad that she didn't say eagle instead of Peter, or this whole scheme would feel almost tailor-made for the four houses.

It would be interesting to see a whole family sorted into different houses, unlike the Weasleys who are just Gryffindors through and through.

I feel half-way certain that I must've read something about this somewhere at some point, or it wouldn't have jumped off the page and bitten me like it did last night. So forgive me if the thoughts aren't entirely original. I just found it fun to contemplate story worlds colliding. I've written about that in other ways before, both here (where I find preludes to Rowling in E.M. Forster) and here (where I find them in Elizabeth Goudge). Hmm. And I've found bits of Tolkien in Rowling too. Once again, we realize just what a wonderful story soup Rowling has stirred up in Harry Potter.

The Annual "Happy Birthday, JKR and Harry!" Post

It's the birthday of author JK Rowling and her beloved fictional wizard Harry Potter! Jo Rowling is 49 (in real life) and Harry would be 34 today.

In honor of the day, I thought I would re-post a reflection from my archives. I'm cheating just a tiny bit -- or rather, double-dipping -- in that the post is just as much about Tolkien as it is about Harry Potter. Given that we're in the midst of The Two Towers right now as a family, however, I've had Tolkien very much on my mind, and happened to be revisiting this post today. It's an oldie but a goodie.

I hope Harry and Jo both gets lots of owl post today!

The Train Station That Suggested Infinity

I love it when books wave to each other across the years.

You know how it goes. You're reading along, and suddenly a sentence or a passage jumps up and rings a bell in your brain. (I'm thinking about those games at fairs where you have to pound with a hammer to propel something up toward the bell. Sometimes it comes close but doesn't quite make it, plummeting back to earth, but sometimes it zooms right up and rings.)

That's what it can feel like when you're reading along and encounter words whose ideas or music somehow triggers the memory of other words you've read before. It's particularly fascinating when you're not on the lookout for it, because you have no idea if these two writers have ever "met." Their respective place and space in time may have made an actual meeting impossible, though sometimes these connections feel so strong you wonder if the second writer knew the first, and if so, how deep the influence goes. Has she read everything writer one ever wrote, so the influence just seeps in naturally? Did she stumble upon this passage one day and have an illuminating flash of how she might one day use it in a story of her own? Is the connection purely coincidental and serendipitous, based on their shared love of certain other writers? Or (and this last mysterious question can make you shiver) is the connection you see there unique to the three of you: these two writers and you, the reader who is building the bridge?

I found myself thinking about all this the other day when I was reading E.M. Forster. I recently finished A Room With a View, my first foray into his work, and moved not long after into Howards End. I'm still learning my way around Forster and never quite know what to expect next. He has an authoritative narrative voice, and sometimes that authorial voice trips into interesting rabbit trails and side fancies.

One of those happens toward the end of chapter 2 in Howards End, when a woman named Margaret is dropping someone off at a train station in London. Forster muses: "Like many others who have lived long in a great capital, she had strong feelings about the various railway termini. They are our gates to the glorious and unknown. Through them we pass out into adventure and sunshine, and to them, alas! we return..."  He then goes on to muse about the different ethos in each train station, how each one can suggest something different to imaginative sensibilities.

"To Margaret -- I hope that it will not set the reader against her -- the station at King's Cross had always suggested Infinity. Its very situation -- withdrawn a little behind the facile splendors of St. Pancras -- implied a comment on the materialism of life. Those two great arches, colourless, indifferent, shouldering between them an unlovely clock, were fit portals for some eternal adventure, whose issue might be prosperous, but would certainly not be expressed in the ordinary language of prosperity..."

And suddenly, of course, I'm sitting with Harry Potter and Dumbledore in the misty, empty version of King's Cross to which Harry is transported in Deathly Hallows. I know that train stations as way stations to other worldly experiences are not unique to J.K. Rowling (to make one more jump, one could certainly say that the train in C.S. Lewis' Prince Caspian was a gateway to adventure, and that alas! the children had to return from Narnia to the station) but reading this gave me such a pleasurable shiver of recognition. I also have no idea if Rowling ever read the passage. But isn't it delightful? Switch out Margaret's name for Harry's and read it again. "To Harry -- the station at King's Cross had always suggested Infinity."

Kind of makes you wonder if Margaret didn't walk right past platform 9 3/4 on her way home...

Happy Birthday, Harry and JKR!

I used to do an annual birthday post for JK Rowling and Harry Potter. Every July 31st, I'd roll out something from my Harry Potter archives in their honor.

It's been a couple of years since I've done one, but it seems super fitting to do one today since a) I am reading the Harry Potter books to my eleven year old this summer (and she loves them...yay!) and b) I just finished JKR's newest novel, the detective novel she wrote under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. And I liked it very much. Review forthcoming on that some time.

So I'm actually in more of a Rowling/Harry mood than I've been in a long time, but alas, I am also exhausted after one of the hardest days I've had in a long time. My HP writings still occupy their own file, but it's been ages since I've culled through them. So I will cheerfully admit that you're getting one of the first things I happened to land on, a poem I wrote several years ago about Fred and George Weasley. It's based off a moment in Goblet of Fire, but presupposes that you know the whole seven book saga, including Fred's fate. So consider the spoiler alert issued.

Enjoy the poem. And happy birthday to Jo and Harry!

George Weasley Remembers

It’s hard to choose a favorite trick.

Pranking was our bailiwick.

We tried to do things with panache,

give fireworks some extra flash.

To laugh and make another smile

made all our efforts seem worthwhile.

So it’s hard to choose the best

and simply disregard the rest.

But now that I am quite alone

and laughter sometimes feels like stone

I think that there is just one joke

with the power to evoke

a smile but also deep regret.

When we tried to cross the line

and wound up aged for all to see,

I remember Fred’s gray hair and beard,

his lined face looking back at me.

We chortled and we shook with glee

to see ourselves so bent and old.

We loved the fact that we’d been had!

The pranksters pranked by joke so bold.

If only I had realized then

this funny glimpse was all I’d know

of old age with my brother Fred

I would have lingered longer so.

~EMP 

Out of Sorts

So I was up really, really late last night reading and marking a student paper (just a couple more to go). In between reading and marking, I was trying to advance my way, slowly, through the Pottermore site. It's a beautiful, creative site, but my ancient computer, which has connectivity/page load problems, was not happy. I would often have to begin loading things, skip off the site, work for a while, then go back when the page had fully loaded.

With one thing and another, I didn't hit the "sorting ceremony" until 1:30 am.

A word to the wise. Do not let yourself be sorted in your Hogwarts house at 1:30 am.

Another word to the wise. Go with your first gut instinct on responses. Do not second-guess yourself and try to be whimsical (which relates to "do not do this at 1:30 in the morning").

And a final word to the wise: don't take the sorting hat quiz when you've been reading Martin Luther. I know, I know, I'm probably the only person on the planet who would mix these two activities...but still. I mean, Luther was wonderful, but he did have that "sin boldly" thing going on, which may account for the fact that the darn website put me into...

Slytherin!

Are you through laughing?

Me neither.

This is just such a riot. I am so not Slytherin. And I don't say it just because all the baddies came from there. There is nothing about the Slytherin temperament, even its stronger, more positive aspects, that feels remotely like me.

I am not ambitious.

I view power very cautiously (believing that in the human realm, power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely...and loving that in the kingdom realm, God the all powerful shows us his power by being freely willing to give it up).

I do not feel tempted by the dark arts. They make me angry. They repel me. When I am feeling especially full of spiritual health and vigor, I am most tempted to laugh at them because I recognize how pitiful and derivative they are.

And my view of "greatness" (since Slytherin is all about seeing "greatness" in its students)? Well, my favorite picture of greatness is Jesus picking up the basin and towel.

So tell me...how did I end up being chosen for Slytherin? Perhaps it's my deep love for the colors green and silver (for real...I do love those colors...but of course colors weren't part of the quiz, so I don't think that could really be it).

Or maybe it's all that poetry I wrote about Snape seeping back through my consciousness.Or perhaps it's that answering irrevocable questions at 1:30 in the morning thing.

If you've not been sorted into Pottermore yet, take my advice -- go into it fresh as a daisy and answer with your first instincts. Because now I'll never know if I'm really a Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, or Gryffindor, and I know I'm one of the three. I've always suspected Hufflepuff (not intelligent enough for R, not brave enough for G, and deeply, truly prize faithfuless and behind the scenes perseverance).

The Week in Review (3): Prelutsky Poems, Monet Trains, and the Final Harry Potter Film

I'm late posting my round-up of review links from last week. I generally try to do it over the weekend, preferably on Saturdays. Not that I need an excuse, but my computer continues its erratic, moody behavior. I think this is yet one more way that a sweeter and more patient temperament is being nourished in the garden of my heart!

So here are the links to my reviews from last week: two picture books, and a movie everybody else saw in July. (It was worth the wait though.)

There's No Place Like School is the title of a Jack Prelutsky selected collection of poems about school. Written for the elementary age crowd, and recounting familiar school experiences and feelings any child can relate to (no matter what kind of schooling they're involved in) this is a book of fun poems with comic pictures to match. My homeschooler thoroughly enjoyed it. Two Prelutsky poems are included, but there are other great authors represented, including Kenn Nesbitt and Rebecca Kai Dotlich. This was a complimentary review copy provided to me by Greenwillow Books. Life's been pretty hectic the past few months, so I'm happy to finally have a chance to get some Greenwillow reviews up -- hopefully a few more to come soon.

The second picture book is the beautiful Claude Monet: The Painter Who Stopped the Trains. We're on a big Monet kick in our fine arts time this month, and this book is a gem. I'm slowly building a stable of reviews on fine arts resources for children and was really glad to include this one. Links in the review will take you to other reviews I've written on other Monet books and books about other impressionists.

I finally managed to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part 2). It was a Labor Day gift from my husband. My musings about the villains in the piece (and some of the poetic special effects) can be found down below, but my review of the film as a whole is found at the link. I could never love the movies the way I do the books, but in general, it exceeded my expectations.

The Death of Villains (Or "Does Mundane Work for Movies?")

My dear husband gave me a great gift on a rainy Labor Day: a couple of hours to myself and a ticket to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part 2). Though I suspected I was the only person in the crowded theater who was making this film journey for the first time (considering the movie has been out since July) I didn't mind. I was just very happy to finally see the film, which pleasantly surpassed my expectations.

I'll save my longer review for later, but for now, I just had to ask this question: what is up with the death of villains in movies? Have you noticed that real baddies can't seem to just die like normal people? They have to go out in a blaze of pyrotechnics. Maybe this has always been true, but I'd never found myself quite so aware of it as I was yesterday. Even as I marveled over some of the astounding visual effects, I found the back of my mind wondering why they chose to make these deaths look the way they did.

There were three "bad guy" deaths in a row in the final battle of Hogwarts (I'm assuming here that you either know who dies because you've read the books, seen the films, or perhaps just don't care either way...so consider yourself spoiler warned).

Bellatrix dies first. She's terrible -- the torturer of Neville's parents and the murderer of Sirius Black -- and the filmmakers have given her huge amounts of screen time, mostly because Helena Bonham Carter is so good at playing a manically deranged character. The death effect here? Wave after wave of magic spells hit her until she's suspended in mid-air, frozen like the cartoon coyote just before he realizes he falls, and then she shatters. Literally shatters like glass, or even more precisely like ice, into a million little pieces. An interesting effect given her coldheartedness.

Nagini the snake dies next. I won't go into the weirdness of how they handled that scene (so differently from the book) but at least in the end the right hero walloped off her head. And she sort of disintegrates in a swath of black smoke. Fitting because of her magical qualities (no mere snake here) and interesting because the smoke reminds you of ring-wraiths and dementors and all sorts of other evil fantasy creatures. Not to mention the smoky instruments in Dumbledore's office that gave us one of our first subtle clues to the snake's importance to Voldemort.

Speaking of Voldemort: the big bad guy falls last. He too shatters, though instead of an explosive shattering, it's more a falling to pieces. As he and our hero battle, the curse he attempts to kill Harry with is pushed back up through his wand (a la Goblet of Fire graveyard scene, or so it appeared to me) and then pulses through him instead. He is sort of eaten from the inside-out by fire, killed by his own hand. We see him cracking -- and it really does look like cracking, especially with his bald, white head looking so egg-like -- and then he falls to pieces. Visually that's interesting, given the fact that he has been in actual "pieces" for so many years, having given up bits of his soul as he continued down the path of evil and tried to pursue immortality. And the effect was also interesting: we see the pieces flaking apart, like onion skin or burned parchment, and then raining down in ashes (sorry to go into such gory detail, but the visuals were quite arresting).

Okay, it's all interesting and symbolic and all that, but is it necessary? I know, I know...films have to show us what novels can tell us (and allow us to create in our own imaginations) but I've always been sort of fascinated by the way Rowling writes Voldemort's death. There is something almost...well...boring about it. I don't use that word lightly ~ she beat me to it, or close enough. She seems to understand that death coming for Voldemort is enough, all by itself, without it being symbolic, dazzling, unusual, bizarre, poetic-justice death. He is human, after all...though he kept forgetting that fact and kept losing more and more of his humanity. But in the end he's just human -- a broken, lost man who "fell backward, arms splayed, the slit pupils of the scarlet eyes rolling upward. Tom Riddle hit the floor with a mundane finality, his body feeble and shrunken, the white hands empty, the snakelike face vacant and unknowing. Voldemort was dead, killed by his own rebounding curse, and Harry stood with two wands in his hand, staring down at his enemy's shell."

Note that in the moment when he hit that floor with a mundane finality (and can't you practically hear the thump?) Rowling refers to him by his actual name, not by his fearful, grandiose, self-chosen moniker. In this moment we are reminded, with a resounding thud, of his humanness, his frailty, even his lostness. And it works powerfully. It just works, in all its minimalism, the way it should.

But does mundane work for movies? Would the same things that come across on the page come across on the scene if they played the death that way? Those were the kinds of thoughts flitting through my mind as I watched the spectacular battle effects in HP7.

Happy Birthday, Harry!

I've lived for almost fourteen years in the same very small town. I've walked countless miles on the streets and sidewalks. Every block has multiple memories attached to it.

Would you believe I actually have a literary memory rooted here? It has to do with the drugstore about 3 blocks from our house. It's a chain store that's changed names over the years but still looks much as it did when we moved to town. It's not the drugstore where we have our pharmacy so I'm not there too often, but since it's so close, I do pop in from time to time.

When the sweet girl was an infant, I was going through a difficult season. I was filled with joy over becoming a mom and loving our precious baby, but I was also struggling with postpartum depression. Several family members and friends passed away in the first eleven months of our daughter's life. It was a season tempered by high joys and deep griefs, often tumbling close together.

In the midst of all this, I was not always getting much sleep. Sometimes I just needed a break. My dear husband would say "take an hour" and shoo me out the door, often encouraging me to pick up my favorite Chinese food a few blocks away. I was working part-time at the seminary then and had my own office, and I would often take a book and the Chinese food and go hole up in the office (with the door locked) for about an hour, just to have some alone time.

And it was during that season that I fell in love with the Harry Potter books.

I'd read Sorcerer's Stone several months before. And I enjoyed it. D. and I agreed it was highly creative, especially the final chapters (with that eerie and interesting end we hadn't foreseen). I liked the characters, the humor, the plays on words.

But it was a busy season of life. And while I knew I wanted to go on to book two, I didn't feel compelled to read it immediately, the way you sometimes feel when you finish a story.

All of that changed the day I wandered into that little drugstore down the road, worn out and in need of some reading material. It's such a laugh to think I was looking for reading material in a drugstore, of all places. Our shelves at home are crammed with books. The library's about two blocks in the other direction. I was actually looking for a glossy magazine with pretty pictures, preferably of houses and gardens (I was so very tired right then that I'd discovered home and garden type magazines with pretty pictures were my best bet for reading material during the many hours I was nursing my baby).

What I found was a paperback copy of Chamber of Secrets. Oh, I thought, that's the second Harry Potter book. I've been meaning to read that. I picked it up, made sure I had enough money on me to purchase it, and took it to the counter. And I'm pretty sure I started it that afternoon, quite possibly holed up in my office with a carton of chicken and broccoli and a fortune cookie.

The rest, as they say, is history. I loved Chamber of Secrets. It made me laugh, it kept me on the edge of my seat, and I fell in love with Harry and his friends. It was the book that compelled me -- almost immediately -- to go find the third and fourth books (the only ones out at that time) and to wait with eager anticipation for the fifth. And reading that book propelled me into some of the best communal, literary discussion I've ever been privileged to enjoy, discussion that kept going for years.

So here at the end of July 31st, I tip my hat to the local drugstore, a strange literary landmark if there ever was one. I remain inordinately fond of their magazine and book aisle, though I'm not sure I've ever purchased anything else from it. And I also tip my hat to Harry and to his author, J.K. Rowling, and wish them both the happiest of birthdays.

Happy Birthday JKR and Harry (The 3rd Annual HP Birthday Post)

For the past two years, I've posted a poem or essay in honor of Harry Potter's birthday, which also happens to be the birthday of his author, JK Rowling. Last year I decided to make it an annual tradition, so here I am again to hum a few bars of "Happy Birthday to you" and hoist an imaginary slab of smushed chocolate cake (from Hagrid's pocket!) in honor of the day.

By creative reckoning, we know that today would be Harry's 30th birthday -- a milestone birthday indeed, and one that I'm sure causes him to reflect and look back on many birthdays past.

I've had the saints who have gone before on my mind lately, as you can probably tell from yesterday's posting. One of the most powerful elements of the Harry Potter series is how Rowling depicts Harry's departed loved ones and how they help Harry in times of deep need. So for this year, I decided to pull out a poem I wrote about Harry's mother Lily.

*****

Lovely Lily, always smiling,
always winning, always shining,
lovely Lily, prettiest sister,
stubborn friend, staunch resister.
Not easy to sway, no simple romantic,
but once she loves, that love’s titanic.

Lovely Lily, precious wife,
still young mother, willing to give
herself for others, courage blazing,
voice beseeching, green eyes gazing.
Last moments spent with arms spread wide,
protector with nowhere to hide.

Lovely Lily, lioness
protecting cub in deep distress,
now forever memory, voice,
mirror image, finest choice,
shade who comforts, fortress strong,
the one to which he still belongs.

Lovely Lily, look down and see
the lion your cub has grown to be.

~EMP

Many happy returns Harry! And Jo too!

LOST in Thought...One More Time

Since my husband and I watch LOST episodes a couple of days behind the rest of the world (you could say we’re untethered from time!) I always feel behind the curve posting my thoughts and reflections. By the time I can get anything up, much wiser and creative minds than mine have already weighed in. And yet… it’s so much fun. I’ve so enjoyed thinking and conversing about this show, I can’t quite resist the opportunity to put my thoughts down one last time before we reach tomorrow night’s finale.

And yes, we will miss it, not watching it until probably around Tuesday night. I am pretty sure I am putting myself on a media blackout until then, including not checking Facebook (I know too many of our friends will post status updates with their reactions). It’s not unlike what I did when Deathly Hallows was published. I basically went offline the day before the book came out, taking special care to avoid any HP related websites for even longer beforehand, and I didn’t go back on until I’d finished the book. Once again, I find myself not wanting to be spoiled in any way.

D. and I keep talking about what we think will happen, what we hope will happen, what might happen. We’ve actually compiled a list of things we think the show’s writers need to do. We split the page in two, making separate lists for what needs to happen in Sideways world and what needs to happen in Island world. When you put the lists together, it all comes to about three dozen items, which sounds like a lot. But they do have a couple of hours (feature film length!) and we’ve agreed that some of these things don’t need to be given a whole lot of time, but could be hinted at. In fact, we figure some of them will need to be given that sort of treatment, given what’s left to accomplish to bring this amazing and convoluted story to a satisfying conclusion.

D. keeps joking that the writers have a dream assignment – they get to kill lots of characters off in heroic battle, and yet they also get to write them their happy ending (in sideways reality). I think he’s on to something there. Although most of my energy at this point is moving toward mining this story for grace moments and character transformation (and has been tending that way for a long time…see my earlier LOST posts) I do find myself still really intrigued by the whole conceit that has made this last season so interesting, the two branches of reality.

And that’s what I’m seeing them as right now – two branches, one tree (or river, whatever metaphor works best for you). The Jughead moment at the end of last season was far more crucial than ever we realized. “It worked” said Juliet, from the grave, and that’s a pretty amazing thing for them to have told us right off the bat. Our castaways, those who heard that news, couldn’t comprehend it. How could it “have worked” and yet “not worked” at the same time? For obviously there they were, still on island, still struggling with the same old stuff. I still don’t understand it myself, but the way I look at it now, when Juliet (the true heroine of this epic in many ways) detonated the bomb, the explosion seemed to accomplish the splitting of reality. Remember that our castaways were actually fugitives in a time in which they did not belong. So the explosion, on the one hand, jarred them from one record groove to another (to use yet another Daniel Faraday expression) and at the same time, shut down the 1970s reality and changed that timeline from that time forward, so that their plane accident never happened. Reality, for these people, moved in two directions, and we’re going to see those directions meet back up and merge.

But first there’s the matter of unfinished island business. I think one reason that my hubby and I feel confident the writers can pull off most of what they need to in the short time left is that really only two big things need to be accomplished (though in bits and pieces) in the two realities. I looked back over our lists and realized what they each boiled down to. In Island reality, we need to see a victory over Smokey. In Sideways world, we need to see resolution – major resolution within characters (as they become Island enlightened, their current stories merging with the stories/relationships/wisdom gained in their Island reality) and between characters. In fact, almost our whole Sideways list had to do with characters resolving relationships, or at least us being given glimpses that such resolution was on the way.

The victory over Smokey will not come without great cost. Desmond the “fail-safe” is going to be key (pun intended) as I think we all agree. But I think what will turn the tide for the side of right is the willingness of the characters to do whatever they need to in this battle. Choice has always been a big LOST theme, and it’s been shining like a lighthouse beacon lately.

Can I tell you how proud I was of Jack when he stepped up and said “I’ll do it” when Jacob finally came square on what he was asking the candidates to consider? My friend Erin talked about what a wonderful Frodo moment that was, and I loved that comparison, since I’m pretty sure Frodo’s “I will take the ring” would figure into one of my top ten most loved story moments of all time. And I certainly see the comparison. (I also liked her idea that the cave of light is going to be our “Mt. Doom.” Who might be our Gollum, hmm?)

But for me, Jack is so Harry right now. I think it’s partly because both Rowling and LOST are working out of post-modern frameworks, though Rowling’s single-author epic vision seems a lot more cohesive and thankfully a lot less monistic. But consider if you will, with your spello-taped Harry glasses on:

--Jack’s willingness to step up and meet his destiny, even though he has no clue if he’ll survive (and probably doubts he will)

--Jack’s growth from loner guy with a “saving people thing” complex to a man who understands his need for community and family

--Jack’s struggle to have faith, especially when not given complete (or fully honest) information from a mentor figure who has, at times, infuriatingly kept his distance

--Jack’s anger at Jacob for not telling him what Jack thought he needed to know and when (remember the Lighthouse smashup? That immediately called to mind Harry in Dumbledore’s office)

--Jack’s mentor being a wise and powerful yet flawed and broken man who has spent years trying to make up for past mistakes, hoping and praying he’ll find someone who will be the “better man” and be able to do what he can’t

--Jack’s walking away from “ordinary” love and life (in the Oceanic Six storyline, when he sabotaged the good relationship he had going with Kate) and realizing he has a destiny

--Jack constantly being looked to as the leader, and yet powerless in some situations and having to watch the people he loves die

Like Harry, I think Jack is going to have to be willing to sacrifice himself. My husband thinks that the cut on his neck – the one we’ve seen getting worse in Sideways world all season, the one Sideways-Jack doesn’t seem to have a clue about? – is the mark of the fatal wound he’ll receive from the ceremonial knife. He’s the island protector now, and that seems to be the only way a guardian of the island can die.

I think Jack will die, but like Harry, there’s protection in place, a safeguard, something that “tethers him to life” (to use the Rowling phrase) and in this case, it’s the reboot, along with the willingness of the other castaways to do what they need to do, especially Desmond.

In case you can’t tell, I’m loving that there’s not just one hero in this piece. The more we unpack what’s been going on, the more we’re “enlightened” as to the overall story, the more we see how crucial so many people’s actions have been. Jack and Desmond are our key players now (not surprising we lingered so long over their meeting, is it?) but so many others have played crucial roles. Juliet and Daniel, yes, but others too. Sayid, who gave the castaways one more day with his heroism. Ben, broken as they come, and yet I still think deep-down on the side of right, and conning Smokey right up to the finish. Even Kate, whom I know has not gotten a lot of fan-love, has been there at crucial times. Let’s not forget she saved Ben’s life in one reality. I’m also thinking especially of the many times she has been there when Jack, needing reassurance that whatever crazy thing he was about to do was the right thing (or at least that he wasn’t alone in doing it, even if it wasn’t) turned to her. How many times did Kate say “I’m with you,” or “I’ve always been with you” right at the crucial moment, looking him right in the eyes? I can’t help but want them to be soul-mates in the end, mostly because of that.

Oh and John Locke. Beautiful, real John Locke, flawed and lovable. John who wasn’t right about everything, who got played by the Smoke Monster (who seems to thrive on holding people in his thrall – I do so hope that in defeating him, the tortured soul of MIB, used all these years, will finally be able to rest in peace) but John who was right about more than anyone might have guessed. While it’s true that John’s own destiny was not as he wished, and that he made a lot of mistakes based on listening to the wrong voices, John’s simple and unwavering trust that life must have meaning and purpose (despite all evidence in his own life to the contrary) was a huge witness to Jack. It’s what got Jack back to the island, when all was said and done. And if Jack hadn’t gone back – no reboot, no Sideways world, no final battle with Smokey. So John too had his role to play, and I’m so glad that in Sideways world he and Jack can finally like and respect each other, and Jack can do something beautiful to help John heal.

I think it will be fascinating, when this whole story is over (except for the conversations!) to look back over the epic and pull out central pieces. In other words, to look back over the story and ask ourselves, what would it have been like if ______ had not been part of the story. Fill in the blank with the character of your choice! I think we will discover just how important they each were in the unfolding of events.

Ah…so much more I could say. So many questions I still have about the theological ramifications of all this (particularly pertaining to fate and free will and providence) and so many questions about how all this might play out. I find myself curious to know (and a bit worried) about the protection extended to the candidates. Does it vanish when Jacob does? Of course, if Jack gets to make? inherit but bend? the rules now, then I think it’s likely all his friends are still safe, because he’ll do anything to protect them. Yes, I know…I love Jack and it shows. I always have, and I’ve always resonated most profoundly with his struggles and journey, so I’m glad this has turned out to be more his story than anyone else’s – perhaps not too surprising given that our opening moments were literally seen through his opening eyes. (Has this whole story been about Jack’s eyes opening? I think I read that somewhere, and I love the thought.)

I am hoping that Jack will be like Harry in one other profound way too – that he will get his chance at ordinary life and love.

I’ll stop for now. And like I said, I’ll be tuning out a bit until I’m able to tune back in (hopefully unspoiled) a couple of days after the finale.

See you in another life, brotha.

Hooray for Harry!

Well, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (so nice to see it written with its proper title) came in today at #3 in Fuse #8's Top 100 Children's Novels poll. I had to give it a shout-out here because I was so delighted to see it!

With The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe coming in at #4 yesterday, I am 2 for 2 on my top four predictions, though now a bit out of order. My American/British pattern didn't pan out, but that's okay. It will be fun to see both A Wrinkle in Time and Charlotte's Web in the top two spots (she says with supreme confidence...while she keeps her fingers crossed)!

It's also fun to read people's comments about Harry Potter. Everyone seems nostalgic to remember where they were when they read the first one. When you first fell for Harry, where were you?

Amazing Grace and Benjamin Linus

"Maybe I am!" Harry bellowed, and he flung his arms over his head, hardly knowing whether he was trying to hold in his anger or protect himself from the weight of his own disillusionment. "Look what he asked from me, Hermione! Risk your life, Harry! And again! And again! And don't expect me to explain everything, just trust me blindly, trust that I know what I'm doing, trust me even though I don't trust you! Never the whole truth! Never!...I don't know who he loved, Hermione, but it was never me. This isn't love, the mess he's left me in..."

~"The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore," Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Raise your hand if this passage flashed through your mind while you were watching "Dr. Linus" episode 6 of the final season of LOST. "Dr Linus," which wins my vote for the most gut-wrenching, tear-inducing episode of the entire series thus far, gave us three people, three followers/disciples of Jacob, who might have said words quite similar to Harry's in the nadir of their despair. Ilana was in tears much of the night; Richard was headed for the nearest bridge (or stick of dynamite) actually heading back to the place where we think he was once a slave (shades of John Newton's Amazing Grace anyone, in the slave ship references?). Jack didn't have that kind of Harry moment this week, but he had a big one in "The Lighthouse" when his angry mirror-smashing reminded me forcefully of young Harry smashing things all over Dumbledore's office.

And then of course, there was Ben.

Jacob is dead, killed at Ben Linus' hand, and no one who has followed Jacob -- or been touched by him -- seems to know what to do next. But in this episode a number of our castaways (now significantly a blend of castaways and others) seemed to take small fumbling steps out of the pit and toward the light -- or in the case of Ben Linus, a giant leap out of his own grave and into the arms of amazing grace.

Besides the brilliant writing that wove together the sideways plot with the island plot, I was just overjoyed to see the LOST writers take this leap, to offer such a damaged and broken character a real chance at forgiveness, love and acceptance. Ben has been one of the strangest, most convoluted characters on the show -- easy to pity, easy to fear, easy to hate, hard to love (well, at least for some of us!) and never, ever easy to trust.

So much I could write about here, but lots of folks have recapped the episode brilliantly already (check out Doc Jensen, Erin's Lost Reflections, or Arabella at the Hog's Head) so let me just pen a couple of quick reflections.

~First, how powerful was this picture of forgiveness? Ben was shackled, digging his own grave, literally on the brink of death. Ilana was about to kill him in vindication for the murder of Jacob, a man they both loved (but neither understands). Suddenly Smokey/Flocke appears from out of nowhere, offering Ben a chance at supposed freedom. He has enough power to literally unloose Ben from those shackles, but we quickly realize that a physical unchaining is not what Ben needs. If he takes Smocke's offer, he will only be exchanging physical bondage for far worse, ongoing (deepening) spiritual bondage. It's only when he hears Ilana's words of forgiveness and acceptance, later in the jungle (as he holds her at gunpoint and confesses his worst sins, and as she weeps) that Ben is truly freed. That's when the shackles fall, not from his ankles, but from his soul.

~Second, how long has Ben been on this path to redemption? I'm going to venture to say that some of the most important milestones on that path happened when he came face to face with evil. The unknitting of Ben's damaged and ravaged self got worse when he had a hand in Alex's death (a death for which he sought judgment) and the sweater of his soul really started unravelling after he killed Jacob, the supernatural mentor/father figure he has believed himself to be following and listening to for all these years. But when we *really* began to see Ben unhinge was when he faced Flocke in the temple, seeing Smokey for what he was (no matter the disguise he was wearing) and realizing, perhaps for the first time, that there was an evil force opposed to the good, opposed to Jacob and Jacob's side, and that such a terrible evil had manipulated Ben (himself the master manipulator) into doing something horrifying.

In other words, Ben was undone when he was truly faced by evil -- saw it for what it was -- and realized it was also within him.

Think about it. Twice now, before his second encounter last night with Flocke, we have seen Ben Linus face to face with evil: first when he recognized Smokey in the guise of Locke in the temple, and then when he saw Sayid turned murderer in the temple (how interesting that both encounters were in the temple). The look on his face when he saw Sayid was truly unnerving -- he looked like he might be physically sick. Why?

After all, Ben Linus has seen Sayid kill before. He's asked him to. Ben knows all about evil, doesn't he? Ben Linus has done awful things. He has murdered, he has manipulated, he has treated people terribly. In fact, one could argue that the two people he has treated the worst, of all the original castaways, are Locke and Sayid. More than once he attempted to murder John, and finally succeeded in that hotel room in LA. And he manipulated Sayid's grief for his own ends, playing on the worst characteristics of Sayid's nature and prompting Sayid to return to a life of violence that Sayid had been trying to escape.

But although Ben has done these terrible things, he hasn't seemed to realize how terrible they are. He has justified them in the name of good, or in the name of what he thought was good (I'm banking on the fact that much of what Ben has done in the name of Jacob were not things Jacob wanted him to do at all, and that Ben has been deceived and played by Smokey for years). It's only now, when looking into the face of evil, evil shown to him in the faces of two men he has manipulated and terribly wronged, that Ben comes face to face -- not only with the reality of evil, but with the reality of how far it has pervaded his own soul.

Small wonder he looked sick, abandoned, unhinged, and well...dare I say it?...lost.

But that's precisely where grace has a chance to reach us, isn't it? When we get to the end of who we are and realize that what's inside us is all twisted and wrong, when we're not even sure where to turn to for help (and convinced, perhaps, that no one good will ever "have us" -- for "who could ever love a beast?") then forgiveness or love has the chance to speak its word and pierces through the darkness. When Ben heard Ilana's words "I'll have you" he looked stunned, like a man caught in the headlights. And so he was, really, because the same light that showed him his worse self also showed him the only way out of the grave. Ilana spoke a word of grace, the kind of grace that God speaks into our lives. Charles Wesley understood that radical kind of grace when he wrote "And Can It Be" -- "My chains fell off, my heart set free, I rose, went forth, and followed Thee."

~And could it be...that Ben's not through with his journey yet? Could it be possible that Ben might have love and grace to offer others ("he who has been forgiven much, loves much" says Jesus) perhaps even those whose lives he most seriously wounded? It may be too late for him to make any sort of restitution toward John (since the real Locke is dead) but could he have a part in liberating Sayid from his bondage to Smokey, if the real Sayid is still in there somewhere?

Which Harry Potter Would Make Your Top Ten?

One of the most interesting things I've noted, as I've been reading and enjoying Fuse #8 (Betsy Bird) count down the 100 Top 100 Children's Novels, is just how deeply attached readers are to series books. Perhaps it's not surprising since series provide room for stories to obtain epic or multi-generational dimensions. They also give us more page-time with characters, making them feel like beloved friends we've seen not once, but on many return visits.

My own top ten, which I submitted, contained 4 clear series with 3 more that aren't always billed heavily as a series but have sequels that continue with the same characters...hence, they're series! My 7 out of 10 seems to be running just about exactly with the percentage of series books being listed in the overall poll results.

And it was hard to decide which book from the series to choose, something that's been discussed a good bit in the comments at Betsy's blog. If you can only choose one, which one do you choose? Do you go for the first book in the series (which she says she defaulted to if someone listed an entire series as their choice, or said they couldn't possibly choose only one) since that's where characters, setting and story are all introduced? Do you go for the final book of the series, where stories often come to a powerful and cathartic ending? Do you choose the book that drew you most deeply into the series in the first place, or hooked you so you knew you were definitely going to keep reading to the end? Or do you simply choose the one book in the series you ended up loving the most, the one you tend to go back to more than any other? (You know, the one whose binding fell apart first...)

It's a hard call. I found myself defaulting most often to the first book in the series, in part because it was "where it all started" but also sometimes because it was really my favorite. In one case only did I find myself going with the third book in a series.

Of course I've been especially fascinated to watch the poll for Harry Potter. It's interesting to note which books are coming in as "most beloved" and why ~ and there's an interesting mix of people, including teachers, parents, librarians, and yes, kids, who voted. With only the top 25 books left to count down, 3 HPs have made it so far, and comment speculation is keen regarding which of the others will make it or whether or not all 7 might. Care to guess which 3 have made it?


Chamber of Secrets came in at #86, Order of the Phoenix at #38, and Goblet of Fire at #35.



So what do you think? Will the other 4 Harry Potters show up in the top 25? I think Sorcerer's Stone and Azkaban definitely will; I'm less sure about Half-Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows, which seem to work better in tandem than each on their own.

And if you were ranking your top 10 children's novels (defined here as mid-grade books for 8-12 year olds) of all time, would Harry make your list? And if so, which Harry?

10 Things I Missed in the Half-Blood Prince Movie

Due to budget and time constraints, I knew I was going to have to wait for this summer's newest Harry Potter film installment to wend its way to the family theater in our little town. It finally did that this weekend, and I was at last able to sit back and enjoy Half-Blood Prince.

I've been exercising considerable restraint by not reading many reviews beforehand! I did give in and read a couple, but even as I read them, I felt like I was trying to skim while keeping my fingers crossed behind my back. I really wanted to see what surprised, delighted or disappointed me on my own terms. I'm looking forward to going back and really reading some reviews in-depth now!

I plan to write a full review at Epinions, but some initial observations started spinning in my head on the walk home from the theater Saturday. Despite the title, please don't think this is just a list of nit-picks. I weave in thoughts about things I enjoyed as well. HP purist that I am, some changes and omissions bothered me more than others, because they felt like missed opportunities.

Still I found I was able to enter the movie on its own terms more easily than usual. The film world of Harry Potter is so different than the book world that in some ways that's getting easier...with each installment, I feel like we're returning to a world that feels more consistently familiar, even if it still doesn't feel like the landscape of the books.

Without further ado, here were 10 things I especially missed:

1. Color. I expected this film to be emotionally dark, but even the trailers didn't prepare me for this film's visual darkness. Sometimes it wasn't even so much darkness as plain lack of color in key places. The cave scene where Dumbledore drinks the awful potion guarding the fake horcrux is one case in point. The whole scene felt washed out, full of blacks, whites, grays...there was almost an ice sculpture feel to the inferi-surrounded island with the basin, and certainly no green glow. That poisonous Slytherinesque green always felt central to me.

I liked the bright green serpentine hourglass in Slughorn's office, which provided an arresting visual link between the Slughorn-Riddle memory sequences. But I just missed color: the brighter gold I'd always imagined for liquid luck, the more lurid colors of Dumbledore's plum colored suit in the memory sequence where he first meets young Riddle. The memory sequences themselves felt purposefully infused with a washed-out/bad-print old movie feel, made murkier by that inkblot-in-water pensieve effect the filmmakers clearly loved. Cool effect, but it made the whole memory sequences feel less substantial somehow, more dream-like than something Harry actually bodily fell into and experienced.

And speaking of the pensieve memories, kudos to the set designers for that odd medieval castle-like cabinet where Dumbledore kept all the little vials of Voldemort memories, each of them dated and sorted. More than anything that actually got said (Kloves in his usual "exposition be scorned" mode) the shots of that cabinet gave us a real understanding of how long and hard Dumbledore had worked to catalog and understand Voldemort's past.

2. "You are with me/I am not worried, Harry…I am with you." The key Dumbledore quotes of the book, and the ones that so brilliantly bookend the narrative action and emphasize the turning of the tide. I had been prepared for this glaring omission by Janet and Erin, but I still felt stupefied by their exclusion. I know the whole Dumbledore/Harry relationship has been played quite differently in the films than within the books, but even so, the inclusion of these lines would have felt like a no-brainer for me had I been writing that screenplay!

3. "Blocked again and again and again until you learn to keep your mouth shut and your mind closed, Potter!" Was anyone else as excited as I was about hearing Alan Rickman deliver those lines, with all their venom and hidden meaning? I guess I shouldn't have been surprised by their absence. The films are famous for not giving Rickman enough screen time, and though he squeezes every ounce from every scene (I especially thought he did well with the unbreakable vow) I was disappointed in his final scenes. The whole climax was disappointing but the lack of anguish in Snape when confronted by Harry was especially disappointing.

I may not be playing fair: the anguish was there, I guess, just not at all at the level of intensity as I'd imagined it -- and that goes for Harry's anger too. Hardly anyone seemed to notice, for instance, that Hagrid's house had just burst into flames. Where was Fang's howling (which could have served to heighten the tension and also remind legions of faithful HP readers that Snape's pain was described in terms of the dog in the burning house)? Where was Harry's fear over the possible loss of Hagrid (for that matter, where was Hagrid in this film? Hardly around.) The fact that we'd also already seen the Burrow (the Burrow?!?) set on fire also lessened the impact here. My goodness, but they gave a lot of screen time to Bellatrix, who seemed to get her kicks from destroying or torching anything in reach.

4. Neville. I know he doesn't do much in this book, but they preserved almost no role for him at all. I guess Draco's increased role (very well-played by Tom Felton) squeezed out any possibility, but I missed Neville. They did a better job of giving Luna some moments and she's not prominent in this storyline either.

5. The Battle at Hogwarts. I was prepared for this to be missing too, but I still couldn't fathom why. The film does a terrific job of showing us Draco's tortured obsession with his "mission" and the mounting tension of his plans...clearly something, something BIG! is supposed to happen with that spooky vanishing cabinet in the Room of Requirement. (Another bravo for the visuals of the cabinets...I could somehow never quite picture what those things should look like when I read about them, and the cruelly pointed angles and antique look were great.)

In the end, however, the fact that Draco manages to get death eaters into Hogwarts doesn't seem to make any difference at all. Why were they there? They "encourage" him in his task on the tower, they mock Dumbledore a little bit, they exult Dumbledore’s death, and then they hightail it out there in an obedient little line behind the hustling Snape, with only Bellatrix doing her manic bully-dance and destructive bit in the Great Hall. I have heard speculation that the filmmakers felt like they needed to add "menace" to the storyline, hence the weird attack on the burrow, but what more menace do you need than the school itself attacked? I've always felt that those moments with vulnerable 15 year olds fighting death eaters are some of the most perilous. This battle needn't be prolonged...it's more a prelude to the ultimate Battle of Hogwarts at the end of DH...but it should be there. Among other things, it would provide opportunity to show Ginny, Luna, Neville and various order members fighting. I know Ginny gets her moment in the burrow scene, and perhaps they wanted to highlight her, given the romantic build-up between her and Harry (which for the most part, I think they handled well).

6. Harry's invisibility cloak. A key loss. If I'm recalling correctly, we only ever see him use it on the train, when Draco discovers him eavesdropping. Dumbledore doesn't tell him to bring it along or keep it on his person for the entire year, and he certainly doesn't immobilize him beneath it for the key scene on the tower. Maybe they wanted Harry to be more complicit in the scene? His obedience to Dumbledore's orders to stay hidden/not do anything come back to haunt him already at the end of the film, and that's especially played up by the very interesting choice they made to have Snape walk right past him and put his finger to his lips, as though reminding Harry that they're on the "same side.” Ironically, of course, they are, though Harry won't know that for a long time and that moment can only serve to haunt him more in the meantime.

I was expecting to see Harry immobilized, suffering the nightmarish anguish of not being able to move while also under the protection, one last time, of his mentor, who clearly has a plan. While I didn't necessarily like the changes here, I found them interesting. One could argue that we're being set up for the moment when Harry must choose to obey/trust and have the self-control to *not act* on his natural impulses in DH (when he chooses to trust Dumbledore and go after the Horcruxes, not the Hallows). Given the inclusion of the line "trust me" from Dumbledore (which I liked) in the tower scene, I hope that's where they're going.

7. Dumbledore's weakness and gallantry. Just not enough of it here. I don't know how much of this is Gambon's interpretation and how much it comes through in the way they're writing Dumbledore, but he's just so incredibly different than book Dumbledore. We see him weakened initially by the potion in the cave (though he doesn't seem to suffer as much mental anguish) but he snaps back with that huge ring of fire and never really seems to weaken again.

In the book, one gets the feeling that his heroics from the fire-ring up until the tower cost him tremendous and amazing physical effort. The scene where he offers Draco mercy and speaks courteously to the death eaters moves me to tears every time I read it in part because he does these things as he slowly slides, inch by inch, down the wall of the tower, his life and strength almost extinguished, his time already almost poured out. It makes Snape's killing much more understandable as an act of mercy, and it also emphasizes Dumbledore's willing sacrifice of himself. I've always heard his "please" to Snape said in agonized tones. Film Dumbledore was still so calm and in control it was a bit unnerving. And I was surprised, given the fact that I have never failed to cry when reading this scene, that I was completely dry-eyed through the same scene in the film.

8. Ministry menace. One thing that director David Yates did so well in the fifth film was play up the ineptness and petty meanness of the Ministry. I know that permeates the storyline of Phoenix, so perhaps it was a given when thinking about what to emphasize. I missed feeling any sort of ministry presence in this film, beyond a couple of nods from Daily Prophet headlines and a joke in the Weasley twins' new shop (which incidentally did give the film a momentary and dizzying burst of color!). Ministry involvement wouldn't have needed to be as thick as Rowling lays it on but we miss a crucial piece of Harry's coming of age when we don't see his ongoing interaction with official ministry types. A visit from the new minister and an attempt to talk Harry into being the ministry poster boy, calmly rebuffed, would have been a welcome brief inclusion. Given Voldemort's overtaking of the ministry in the final story, and Harry's ongoing clashes with the establishment (think about Scrimgeour's unwilling surrender of the bequests from Albus' will) we could have had some valuable set-up for the final film. As it is, we've not even met Scrimgeour.

9. Exposition about the horcruxes. I bow to Janet Batchler's wisdom; she says they can still get themselves out the hole they've dug on this one in films 7 (parts A and B) and I believe it. But I will be interested to see how. The lack of explanation about horcruxes felt glaring on so many levels (and I wondered if anyone just watching the movies, without the background of the books, would have understood them at all). I missed a lot of things here, including the pensieve memories that would have given us more background on Voldemort and more understanding of his obsession with "things" and places (the ring, the cave).

I thought they took an interesting risk in the pointed way Dumbledore looked at Harry's scar (as though the idea had just come to him? that seemed odd) as they talked about the horcruxes, though Harry's cluelessness, played well by Radcliffe, rang true. I missed the litany of the horcruxes at the end, which book Harry receives and repeats from Dumbledore like marching orders, like a life-line that helps him to understand, at least a little, what he needs to do next. Whenever I read that, I always feel echoes of Aslan giving Jill the signs in the Silver Chair.

10. More time with Moms. Narcissa seemed more fragile than I expected. Without the Gaunt memories from the pensieve, we lost our introduction to Merope. The difference between Harry and Tom's mothers has always felt profound and sad. I also missed more time with the Weasley family -- we hardly see Molly at all, except to watch her mourn the inexplicable loss of her house. And while I thought Slughorn's musings about Lily incredibly moving -- Jim Broadbent turned in an amazing performance -- I still wish there had been a little more talk of Lily in terms of Harry supposedly "inheriting" her potions skill. How easy it would have been to show Snape galled because of that and all its consequent layers of meaning.

I missed other things (Dursleys being lectured by Dumbledore, Moaning Myrtle, Luna's commentary at the Quidditch match, mopey Tonks in love with Lupin) but I think these were my main 10, at least on first viewing. I was pleasantly surprised Rupert Grint's really funny performance as the lovestruck Ron, and I loved the moment where Harry still looked like the magic-struck eleven year old while he watched Dumbledore set Slughorn’s house to rights with a few waves of his wand.

At least on first listen, I found Nicholas Hooper's score disappointing. The main themes he developed in Phoenix (like the "Fireworks" theme for the Weasley twins) were back, but I was hoping to be wowed by his music for the cave or the tower scenes. I don’t remember the music much at all.

All in all, very glad I finally saw the film. I feel genuinely curious about how they’ll approach the two-part finale, especially given the challenges they’ve set themselves! Your thoughts?

Happy Birthday JKR and Harry!

I missed marking one of the important July dates on my literary calendar: the 18th was the anniversary of Jane Austen's death. But I didn't want to forget to mark the birthday of author J.K. Rowling, a birthday she shares with her fictional creation Harry Potter.

If my reckoning is right, Harry is 29 today. I always like to picture him sitting up late on his birthday eve, recollecting the midnight birthday reflections of his youth. Some of Harry's birthdays (many of which we got glimpses of) were very important, most especially his eleventh.

Last year I dipped into the archives of things I've written about HP and reprinted an essay in honor of this day. I thought I'd make it a tradition, so went poking about my files. I've not written very much Harry Potter inspired poetry (unlike my wonderfully poetic friend and fellow HP enthusiast Erin!) but I have penned a few poems. Here's one I wrote, post Deathly Hallows, from Ron's perspective. I've prefaced it with some of the original comments I jotted about the poem.

Happy Birthday JKR and Harry!

*******
One of my favorite scenes in Deathly Hallows (and there are many) is the scene when Ron finally returns to Harry and Hermione. I especially love the moment when he sheepishly says that Dumbledore must have known that he would run out on them, hence the gift of the deluminator. And Harry says, so readily and so graciously (showing a growing wisdom) that no, Dumbledore must have known that Ron would always want to find a way back. What a beautiful insight into Dumbledore and into Ron, and what a wonderful way of looking at his friend and finding the best in him to love.

The deluminator itself is fascinating, perhaps even moreso because we're led to believe Dumbledore invented it. And of course, it's one of the very first magical objects we ever see in the Harry Potter books.

The Gift of the Deluminator

When Dumbledore gave me this gift,
I had no idea of the rift
that would come between Harry and me.

Though I thought that the present was cool,
I’m dense as a general rule --
and the point wasn’t easy to see.

For putting out lights it was great,
but I still thought there must be a mistake,
for what else was this gift really good for?

No doubt we might go undercover
in the dark so we’d not be discovered.
Was that all? I still wasn’t sure.

Of course what I didn’t know
was that darkness inside me would grow
as we toiled so long on our quest,

and that one day I’d balk,
cut ties and just walk
away from the friends I loved best.

How amazing to learn
as I longed to return
that the gift was so wise from the start.

Though it seemed to make night
what it did was move light
to illuminate inside my heart.

That’s how I returned
to the friends I had spurned,
the friends I will always hold dear.

The light led me on
and the way that it shone
made the pathway ahead of me clear.

~EMP

Reading Round-Up: Midsummer Edition

If the first quarter of the year was mystery reading time, then second quarter reading was definitely steeped in fantasy. I haven't actually planned to get so "into" certain types of reading each quarter; it's just the way things have worked out so far this year!

Here are a few notes on my reading from the second quarter. Links are to my full-length reviews on Epinions.

April/May/June reading was steeped in C.S. Lewis for me, though his name won't show up on my list of "books read." That's because I've been reading chapters and essays from a number of books about Lewis (in addition to reading some more by him that I've not finished yet). I plan to do a whole Lewisian post soon, with titles of some of the wonderful things I've been reading and re-reading. One of my favorites, and a book I did finish this spring, is A Reader's Guide to Caspian: A Journey Into C.S. Lewis's Narnia by Leland Ryken and Marjorie Lamp Mead. Ryken and Mead, both respected Lewis scholars/teachers/researchers, have created a wonderful "guided tour" into the second book of the Chronicles (they've also written one for LWW, which I've not read yet) that I think would be particularly rich for high school and college aged students.

My second quarter reading was colored by the last leg of my re-read of the entire Harry Potter series, especially the final three volumes. I'd not read Deathly Hallows since the summer it came out (when I read through it once at top-speed in the days after its release, then read it aloud to my husband, our tradition) and the book felt incredibly fresh to me as a result. I'd forgotten parts of it, and reading it right on the heels of Half-Blood Prince was marvelous. I've loved it from the start, but I was moved on much deeper levels than I expected upon this read-through. I also finished Travis Prinzi's excellent Harry Potter & Imagination, which I've not yet reviewed but still want to. It's very thoughtful: not only full of insights into HP (particularly Rowling's inclusion of social justice issues) but into the Christian fantasy tradition in general.

By the way: total HP side note/rabbit trail, but did you know that when you enter Dumbledore's name in an anagram generator, one of the many fascinating things it turns up is "BOLD DEMURE"? Fun!

Second quarter also found me reading George MacDonald's The Lost Princess; Shannon, Dean and Nathan (no relation) Hale's Rapunzel's Revenge (a graphic novel); and N.D. Wilson's 100 Cupboards. I was less taken with Cupboards than I expected to be (perhaps my expectations were too high) but am looking forward to finding and reading the sequel, which I hear is even better.

One of the most pleasant surprises of my reading spring was my ability to get, via inter-library loan, the first novel in Regina Doman's young adult fairy-tale/fantasy series, The Shadow of the Bear. A contemporary re-telling of Grimm's Snow White and Rose Red, it's darker and more thrilling than I expected, just a terrific read from start to finish.

Spring felt like just the right time to read Linda Sue Park's mid-grade novel Keeping Score, the story of a young Brooklyn girl in the 1950s and her deep love for the Dodgers. I had what felt like some personal associations with the story-line, but it would have been a gem in any respect.

Spring was also just the right time to enjoy John Yow's recently released book of essays: The Armchair Birder: Discovering the Secret Life of Familiar Birds. If you know any devoted backyard birders, this would be a great gift book. The essays are witty and stuffed with good research as well as careful observations. Conversational in tone, the kind of book you like to read on a porch or on a blanket at the park -- with your binoculars handy.

The Joys of Re-Reading

One of the many blessings of discovering kindred spirits in online reading communities is the realization that I am not alone as a re-reader.

I have always loved re-reading books. As a child, the books I loved most were books I went back to again and again. It surprised me when I discovered that not everybody did this, and I went through a period of time when I thought perhaps I was just weird or perhaps not as smart as people who could get everything they needed or wanted from a book the first time through and go on to other things.

Gradually I began to realize that I wasn't re-reading because I forgot "things that happened" in a story (though sometimes I did, and part of the joy was rediscovering events or lines I'd forgotten!) but for the sheer pleasure of revisiting a world I'd loved the first time through. We would never say "oh, I've been to grandma's house once, so I never need to go again." Every trip is different and new, even though elements of such visits are comfortingly familiar.

I use grandma's house as an analogy partly because it was my own paternal grandmother, who came to live with us when I was nine, who presented me with one of my first pictures of an adult re-reader. My parents, who loved books and made sure our house was full of them, were rather busy in that season of my life, busy raising four of us children, taking care of my invalid grandmother, and working hard at their various jobs and household tasks. They both read, but mostly late at night or in the cracks and crevices of their busy lives.

(Side note: I still recall marveling that my mom could fall asleep over a book, something I almost never used to do -- until the past few years. Middle age has not deprived me of my love of reading, but it has ensured there are times when I simply cannot keep my eyes open and end up with my face pillowed on a paperback.)

But my grandmother, who was confined to bed for large portions of the five years she lived with us, seemed to read constantly. And I was intrigued that she went back to her favorites again and again. Suddenly I didn't feel so strange about reading Little Women for the third or fourth time, because there was Mamaw cracking open the red covers of Jane Eyre again.

I've been reading C.S. Lewis' An Experiment in Criticism for the first time, and it's such a delight to hear Lewis talk about the joys of re-reading. He hails literary readers as "deep" readers, who often want or need to go back to the same book again and again. He seems to feel that a good book is a book that can and should be revisited often. All of this gels wonderfully with the thoughts of John Granger, whose reflections on the Harry Potter stories I've enjoyed now for several years. In his new book, Harry Potter's Bookshelf (due to be released tomorrow!) John talks about the "slow mining" one can do in the great books, books that have been written with more than one level of meaning and that provide rich treasures for those who are willing to keep going back to dig.

I don't often consciously choose what to re-read when, but more often than not, I find myself busy with a re-read at the same time I'm reading other books for the first time. Certain authors seem to pull me back into their worlds at regular intervals, and even sometimes in regular seasons (Austen is almost always an autumn/winter re-read for me.)

At the moment I'm re-reading J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit and absolutely loving it. Although I typically re-read Tolkien's Lord of the Rings every 5-7 years, it had been quite a while since I'd done a full read-through of The Hobbit. I'm guessing it's been at least a decade (I know the last time was before the sweet girl was born, at any rate, so over 7 years). I'm about fifty pages from the end now, with the Battle of the Five Armies on the horizon, and while certain images and scenes have definitely come back to me, I'd also forgotten many things. It's been wonderful to re-read for the sake of the story itself, but also eye-opening to think of it as a "prelude" to LOTR (so many foreshadowings and set-ups!) and even to read it with my recent re-read of the Harry Potter series in mind.

I'm still not sure where I fall on the spectrum of thoughts about Tolkien's influence on Rowling (how direct or conscious such influence was) but it's been interesting to note certain similarities. One realization I had was how much Rowling pulls on and yet also subverts, in her usual fascinating way, the story tradition of dragons. Tolkien's Smaug is such a nasty, greedy brute, hoarding every bit of plundered treasure so that he knows down to the last ounce exactly what he's sleeping on, even though he never puts any of it to use except to encrust himself in diamond armor.

It makes perfect story-telling sense for Rowling to have dragons guarding the treasures in the vaults at the deepest levels of Gringotts, the wizarding bank, but the plight of those dragons seems so sad as they're not free (not even free to be greedy and nasty as in stories of old!) and the treasures they are guarding are not their own. By the time we get to Deathly Hallows, we've been long set up to feel sympathy for dragons through Hagrid's care for a baby dragon (and his love for all wild things) and even Harry's grudging admiration for the Hungarian Horntail. The dragon the trio meets in Deathly Hallows is a sad portrait of a proud creature now broken and in chains, trained like a beaten dog to guard someone else's hoard. It makes the whole escape from Gringotts in DH yet another yet moment when Harry, acting on intuition and his own love-shaped character, frees an oppressed fellow-creature. I know it's not his main purpose (he needs to find an escape route, after all!) but it's a happy by-product of his actions, and one that he never seems to regret. As much as JKR writes about Harry's "saving people thing" it's his "freeing people/creatures thing" that feels almost as interesting, whether it's making glass walls disappear at the zoo so the boa constrictor can slither away or making sure Mr. Malfoy hands Dobby a sock. And oh, the fruit of Dobby's freedom...

I did happen to notice that the bit of treasure that Bilbo first sneaks from Smaug's mountain of treasure (the missing bit that enrages the dragon once he wakes up and realizes he's been robbed) was a two-handled cup. It reminded me forcefully of Helga Hufflepuff's cup, the horcrux Harry, Ron and Hermione manage to get from Gringotts and then flee with on the back of the dragon. This time around, the enraged creature is not the dragon (who could care less about the treasures he's guarding for wizards and goblins and only wants his freedom) but red-eyed almost totally inhuman Voldemort. No wonder Voldemort has such an affinity for snakes and basilisks. He's got a greedy, hoarding dragon heart.

100 Species Challenge #4: Mayapple

On Friday, the sweet girl and I went on a field trip with one of the families in our homeschool group. We headed to a nature center about 20-30 minutes from here and had a marvelous time seeing and hearing all sorts of amazing creatures great and small. Our favorite sounds belonged to croaking bullfrogs (we saw about a dozen of them, poking their eyeballs just above the surface of the pond) and hammering woodpeckers (we heard them but didn't see them). We also saw tadpoles in various stages, thousands of termites devouring an old log, and countless beautiful trees.

One plant we saw in the woods intrigued me so much I decided to take this photo so I could bring it home and identify it. The kids kept noticing the large, umbrella like leaves and I was surprised to find this mostly round white flower clinging to the front of the stem and sheltering under the leaves. Not all of the plants were flowering, but the ones that were had only one flower.

Thanks to Peterson's wildflower field guide, I now know this is a mayapple (podophyllum peltatum). It's a perennial plant found in woodlands; the flower usually appears in May and is later followed by a lemon colored berry. According to Peterson's, everything but the berry (which can be made into jelly?) is toxic.

The funniest thing was that I had no flash of recognition when I read its English name, but the light bulb went off for me when I saw the Latin name. Podophyllum happened to be the name of the homeopathic remedy that got me through a terrible intestinal virus in March. (Recall that homeopathic remedies are made with miniscule and very diluted amounts of substances which would otherwise be toxic.) So thank you, Lord, for the helpful medicinal qualities of this unusual woodland plant!

One more funny note: the plant has gone by many other names, including wild lemon and also mandrake. One website where I read information mentioned that in English folklore, the plant has been described as screaming when it's pulled from the ground, with its screams driving people insane. Ah-ha! Anyone else think that JK Rowling has read this bit of folklore? Good Harry Potter reader that I am, I couldn't help but laugh...and consider reaching for my fluffy pink earmuffs.

Respect for the Body: Lessons from the Deaths of Mad-Eye Moody and Boromir

I've been working my way very slowly through Travis Prinzi's delightful book Harry Potter & Imagination: The Way Between Two Worlds. There are books I gulp, and then there are books that I want to gulp but realize early on that I would be better served by enjoying slowly and steadily, reading them with pen in hand. Travis' book falls into the latter category for me. After I'd raced through the first two chapters, I decided to start over (with that pencil handy) and read it at a more sane pace. I'm glad I did, for it stands up to that kind of rigorous reading.

I keep meaning to jot some of my thoughts about the book here, but haven't had the opportunity. This morning, however, I was reading along in Chapter 4, Travis' treatment of how Rowling defines and deals with evil in the HP series, and came upon his comment that...

"...Rowling is no Gnostic dualist when it comes to the human being. While there is no unambiguous discussion about a future bodily resurrection in the Christian sense of the idea, Rowling shows tremendous respect for the body. When Mad-Eye is killed, there is no question in the minds of Bill and Lupin about what must be done:

"Mad-Eye's body," said Lupin. "We need to recover it."

"Can't it --?" began Mrs. Weasley with an appealing look at Bill.

"Wait?" said Bill. "Not unless you'd rather the Death Eaters took it?"

Nobody spoke. Lupin and Bill said good-bye and left."

Travis goes on to say how significant it is that they all accepted the importance of recovering Mad-Eye's body before the Death Eaters got to it. "There is nothing of the kind of dismissal of the body that we often hear at funerals..."

I was struck by this (and his following reflections) on various levels. But I also paused because a lightbulb went off over my head. "Ah!" I said. "Boromir!"

Remember Boromir in Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings? He was the member of the Fellowship who tried to take the ring from ring-bearer Frodo, then died in a valiant attempt to save Merry and Pippin from a foul band of Orcs.

Back in 2002, my friend David Mills wrote a terrific article for Touchstone magazine entitled The Writer of Our Story: Divine Providence in the Lord of the Rings. I commend the whole article, which is archived here. But the section that stood out to me when I first read it and the one I've not forgotten in all these years is what David writes about the death of Boromir and his friends' care for the body of their fallen comrade (fallen, one might almost say, in more than one sense):

"To obey the laws of their world, they must bury their fallen comrades, but if they do, they will lose several hours before they can chase the Orcs. “First we must tend the fallen. We cannot leave him lying like carrion among these foul Orcs,” says Legolas, and Gimli agrees. But Aragorn says, “But we do not know whether the Ring-bearer is with them [the Orcs] or not. Are we to abandon him? Must we not seek him first?”

It is, as Aragorn says, “an evil choice,” and as far as they know, one that will decide the fate of the whole world. The Orcs, they assume, are servants of Sauron and are taking the Hobbits to him. If the Orcs have captured Frodo, Sauron will get the Ring and the world they love will die. If the Orcs have only captured the other Hobbits, Sauron will torture them in unimaginable ways and learn from them Frodo’s plan and his last known location. Then it will not take Sauron long to find Frodo, and when he finds him, the world they love will die.

It is obvious, to most of us, that they ought to leave the body. Boromir had betrayed them, after all. Burying him could do him no good and would lead, almost certainly, to the final success of evil. And yet they bury him, because that is the right thing to do.

When I first read the book, as a typically secular-minded American twelve-year-old, this scene astonished me. It made no sense. It seemed to me a flaw in the story that these three heroes should do something so pointless and irrational and self-defeating. This is the reaction of those who do not believe in Providence."

David's further comments, in the context of his article, show that if we're looking aright, we can actually see the hand of Providence clearly at work in their seemingly senseless but respectful action. "Because the three spend several hours burying Boromir, they never catch the Orcs who had kidnapped their friends..." he writes, and goes on to explain the whole "domino" chain of events that arises from the fact that Merry and Pippin escape on their own, meet the Ents, etc.

The issue of Providence is one that I think has been under-explored thus far in Harry Potter studies. Is there something comparable going on, either in this decision of Mad-Eye's friends or in other moments where we see Rowling's characters choose "what is right over what is easy"? (to quote Dumbledore). Worth pondering.

But for today I'm simply enjoying the parallels of the two scenes, and what they tell us about proper respect for the body in stories shaped by Christian vision. Bodies, of course, as Travis points out, "matter" (and what a lovely play on words). In a week where we've been reminded by the church that "we are dust and to dust we shall return" we also remember that the sign marked on our foreheads is the sign of a cross, and that our bodies, along with the rest of us, have been fully redeemed by the God who first made human bodies and called them good and then took on flesh in order to redeem fallen and broken humanity.

In a culture often uncomfortable with bodies (that too often chooses to worship, indulge, denigrate or neglect bodies, all skewered responses to the flesh) it's refreshing to come across stories that put bodies in proper perspective. They are not the end-all, but they matter. To God and therefore to us.

Elizabeth Goudge's "The Well of the Star"

One of my favorite things to do during the Advent, Christmas and Epiphany seasons is to read short stories and legends from seasonal collections. We have several wonderful collections that we either own or check out of the library almost annually.

One collection I like is titled Home for Christmas: Stories for Young and Old. Published by Plough Publishing House in 2002, it contains a number of excellent stories from writers as diverse as Pearl Buck, Ruth Sawyer, Henry Van Dyke, and Katherine Paterson. One reason I like it is the number of good women writers represented.

One of the stories that I read for the first time this year was "The Well of the Star" by Elizabeth Goudge, perhaps best known for her children's fantasy novel The Little White Horse. That book has had a renaissance in recent years, partly because J.K. Rowling has spoken of it with such fondness. My reprint copy contains a blurb where she mentions how much she "adored" the book as a child.

Reading Goudge's beautiful Christmas tale, which follows the fortunes of a poor, ragged boy named David who comes across the wise men journeying from the east on the night of Christ's birth, was a pleasure on several levels. But I'm always interested in noticing literary echoes, or seeing literary antecedents, and it struck me that this might well be another Goudge story with which Rowling is familiar.

That's because the image of the title, "The Well of the Star," will look very familiar to readers of Harry Potter. When David, shivering, cold, and hungry, is wishing for a miracle to save his desperate family (his sick father is out of work, and the family is starving) he thinks of a legendary wishing well "far down below on the road to Bethlehem."

"It was a well of clear sparkling water and it was said that those who stood by it at midnight, and prayed to the Lord God Jehovah from a pure heart, were given their heart's desire. The difficulty, of course, was to be pure in heart. They said that if you were, and your prayer had been accepted, you saw your heart's desire mirrored in the water of the well -- the face of someone you loved, maybe, or the gold that would save your home from ruin, or even, so it was whispered, the face of God Himself."

A mirror that gives one their heart's desire...and the need to be pure in heart. Hmm. Where have I heard these themes before?

Goudge's beautiful story is worth reading for its own sake. The well first reveals the star (which the wise men have momentarily lost) to Gaspar, after David tells them how the well works. David finishes the journey with them and is so moved by the baby King that he gives him the only thing he possesses, a small shepherd's pipe. He ends up going home with the shepherds (his old friends) who have also been to pay the baby homage. Once the wonder of the stable begins to wear off, David realizes that he is still poor, needy and desperate, and now seemingly has even less than when he started out that evening...he no longer even has his pipe to comfort his family with music. He cries bitterly and then finally stumbles back to the wishing well one more time.

"He did not pray to be a rich man, he did not look into it for his heart's desire, he simply went to it to wash himself..."

And in that moment comes blessing, joy, and a true answer to his prayers. The King to whom he gave everything does not leave him empty-handed. He never does.