18 years later, still a waiting list

I was standing in the local public library today on my lunch hour, checking out the books on offer at their standing book sale, when I heard the following conversation:


Staff Member: "No, The Philosopher's Stone is the first one."


Man with small child: "Oh, then which is the second one?"


Staff Member: "The second one? That's The Chamber of Secrets."


Man with small child: "Then that's the one I want."


Staff Member, checking her computer: "Sorry, sir, all copies of The Chamber of Secrets are currently out with clients. Would you like to go on a waiting list?"


My jaw dropped for two reasons: 1) that there could be a single person in the English-speaking world who doesn't already know the titles of the Harry Potter books in their proper order (smile); and 2) that 18 years after it was published, The Chamber of Secrets is still in such demand at my local public library that there is a waiting list to borrow it.


I think it is great that the Harry Potter novels continue to be popular, both in book stores and in libraries. I would think that most successful books are released, enjoy a period of popularity in book stores, a longer period of popularity in libraries, then fade away again, only to re-emerge if and when they are made into movies.


But J.K. Rowling's novels seem to be maintaining a high level of popularity even 18 years after they were published!


I also think it's neat that the man who was inquiring about the Harry Potter books seemed to be about 30 years old and his son maybe 4 or 5. That means that a guy who perhaps read HP when he was 12 is getting ready to read them again, perhaps with his own child, two decades later.


I had to stop myself from rushing over and offering the man a sermon on the wonders of Harry Potter, telling myself to be satisfied with the knowledge that Harry Potter lives on.

Is Snape good or evil? Is he even really one character?

Is Snape good? Or is Snape evil?


According to a report on the CNN website, that argument has again erupted, this time in the Twittersphere and this time focusing on why Harry and Ginny would choose to name their son "Albus Severus", honouring both Harry's biggest mentor and guide in the wizarding world, a man who was almost without fail kind and fair with Harry, and the man who was, for most of the seven-book series, sadistically abusive of Harry and his friends.


Even our favourite author, J.K. Rowling, entered the heated fray.

After what sounds to have been a long and surprisingly vitriolic debate, Rowling tweeted: "There's a whole essay in why Harry gave his son Snape's name, but the decision goes to the heart of who Harry was, post-war."

And further: "In honouring Snape, Harry hoped in his heart that he too would be forgiven. The deaths at the Battle of Hogwarts would haunt Harry forever."

And finally: "Snape is all grey. You can't make him a saint: he was vindictive & bullying. You can't make him a devil: he died to save the wizarding world."

Now, you can go back through my earlier posts on this blog and find snippets here and there that might help you understand my own interpretation, my "take" on this debate and on Rowling's approach to it (and I would encourage you to do so -- I've had a lot of fun writing all these posts and I hope you will be willing to invest some time in reading them) but allow me to summarise my thoughts on the subject here.

First, I agree in some ways with Rowling: Snape is an amalgam of good and evil. Shaped by his early personal experiences, he is a proud, angry, vindictive man. We know that his father was abusive and his parents fought all through his childhood. We know that he was bullied by James and Sirius and their gang and we know that, in the midst of all that, he fell very deeply and irrevocably in love with Lily Evans, one of the few major characters in the books who is presented as being without fault.

But I also think it is important that, while Snape turns out to be fighting on the side of good, he was also a brutal, nasty, horrible person in situations where such egregious behavior was not at all necessary. Nothing required him to bully Neville throughout his years at Hogwarts; nothing required Snape to pick on Ron and Hermione either.

Even if we buy the argument that Snape's terrible relationship with James Potter in some way explained and excused his behaviour toward Harry, I doubt very much it can possibly excuse just how awful he was to our boy hero. Not even the argument that Snape needed to convince and re-convince Voldemort that he was not an agent for Dumbledore could explain away just how unnecessarily cruel Snape was to Harry and his friends.

Further, even if we accept that Snape is a good guy, he did help bring about the deaths of two other of the good guys: Emmeline Vance and Sirius Black.

How does that fact impact the argument with regard to Snape? As I have written before, at its heart, this is a moral question. Is it morally acceptable to sacrifice at least two lives in hopes of avoiding the deaths of many many more? And, if we can forgive Snape the deaths of Vance and Black simply because Snape turns out to be willing to sacrifice himself to help defeat Voldemort, can we forgive him his earlier behaviour toward these children, when he was in the role of teacher, for the same reason?

I think our analysis of Snape has to take into account the evolving complexity of the books, the characters and their situations, from The Philosopher's Stone (which is a children's book) to The Deathly Hallows (which is a fully adult novel).

In the early books, Snape was basically a cardboard figure who represented evil. He was only and utterly Harry's nemesis. Whether or not Rowling had fully fleshed out, when she wrote the first three books, the complex and contradictory role Snape would eventually play in the later novels, Snape is presented early on as a flat, mysterious, horrible character.

More importantly, he was the key to one of the earliest examples of one of Rowling's favourite narrative strategies: misdirection. In The Philosopher's Stone, for example, Snape had to be presented as irredeemably evil in order to draw the reader's attention away from Quirrell, one of the two true villains of that story.

I would argue that, as the novels progressed and increased in depth and complexity, Rowling added more depth and complexity to her characters. She added shades of grey, to use that now horrible expression, to what had been black and white, flat, stock characters.


You see this most specifically with regard to Snape and Dumbledore, though Dumbledore's shades are mostly added only after his death in The Half-Blood Prince.


If I had to state things bluntly, I would say that the Snape of the first four books (especially books one and two) is not the same character as the Snape of the last three (especially the final one). To hold the actions of the early Snape against the later Snape is almost unfair.


In the end, this is not a question of Snape's personality or moral goodness; this is a question of Rowling's narrative strategy.

Rowling shows great care in orchestrating her climactic scenes

As I finished reading The Chamber of Secrets (actually, La chambre des secrets, since I read it in French) the other day, it occurred to me that J.K. was very careful to ensure that Harry faced the final confrontation in each novel alone.

And, since I have been highly critical of the fact that the film makers did everything they could to make the ending of the final movie, The Deathly Hallows, Part 2, a duel between Harry and Voldemort with the fate of the entire world hanging in the balance (where I felt Jo made it very clear 1) that the battle was not Harry's alone and 2) that the tide was actually turning in favour of the defenders of Good before Harry duels the Dark Lord), I wondered why Rowling took such great pains to separate our hero from Ron and Hermione at the end of each of the first two books.

I doubt the following summary is necessary for anyone who is into Harry Potter enough to be reading this bug but, for anyone not familiar with Books 1 and 2, here is what happens:

In The Philosopher's Stone, Hermione and Ron are with Harry when he first sets out to get past all of the protections around the Stone to save it from the antagonist but Ron drops off after he gets injured in the chess match while Hermione solves the potions riddle for Harry only to be forced to turn back since there is only enough of the move-forward potion for one. Harry is, clearly, the one who must go on (as Hermione points out) so he is alone for the final battle.

Meanwhile, in The Chamber of Secrets, Hermione has already been petrified, leaving Harry and Ron to use the information she has collected to find the Chamber and save Ginny. But Harry loses Ron when Ron's wand backfires on Lockhart and causes a cave-in that can't be shifted in tie to save Ginny. Harry is past the wall of rubble; Ron trapped behind it with the befuddled Lockhart. Once again, Harry must face the final battle alone.

The question is: why?

Rowling makes it a clear point of focus as the novels move on that, while Harry is at the centre of the storm that is Lord Voldemort's return, the battle against the Dark Lord and his minions is shared by everyone. Hermione and Ron, in particular, show continued dedication to the battle throughout the rest of the books.

I thought about this question for some time and I think the answer is quite clear. And fairly simple.

When Harry finally faces Voldemort with a companion in tow (Cedric Diggory in the fourth book, The Goblet of Fire), Voldemort is cold-blooded about what he requires his disciples to do with anyone who shows up other than Harry. While the Dark Lord's instructions with regard to Harry are clear and consistent ("Leave him to me"), Voldemort does not hesitate in the graveyard in book 4 when Harry shows up with a friend: "Kill the spare," he orders and Diggory is summarily dismissed.

Rowling recognised in the first two books that it was in the Dark Lord's character simply to kill anyone who gets in his way. She could not permit Hermione or Ron to be there at the end because they would die instantly. Not only would that be an incredible waste of these wonderful characters, it would be a great deal too much for the young readers in the target audience to bear.

As a result, she arranged things to ensure that Harry met Voldemort alone in Books 1 and 2. Book 3 involved only the Dark Lord's henchman and not You Know Who himself, so Hermione and Ron could take part in the climax of the story.

Then, when Jo felt her readers were mature enough, she ends Book 4 with the death of Harry's companion at the climactic scene. And she makes darn sure it's not one of her readers' beloved inner circle.

Getting to know Jo

A Preface to this Entry: I read over some of my recent posts and realized that, if you just read those entries, you might come away feeling like I have a problem with J.K. Rowling. I spend an awful lot of time trying to find mistakes in her work, contradictions in her public statements. I must really hate her. I wrote this latest entry, at least in part, to refute that impression. Jo herself admits in an early interview that, while she didn't expect the Harry Potter books to become so massively popular, she did have hopes when she sent the first novel to the publisher that a small group of nerds would fall in love with and marvel in the incredible detail in the books. Well, Jo, I'm one of those nerds. And I love the detail. So much so that I glory in both its triumphs and its failures.

All of that said, on with my latest blog entry.

I've been watching a lot of video lately. Video of J.K. Rowling... of "Jo Rowling", as she is constantly reminding people... and I have to say: I've come away very impressed.

Sure, we all know what a wonderful and talented writer she is. After all, I'm writing and you are reading this blog because we love a certain seven-book series Jo wrote about a young orphan wizard named Harry Potter.

But, as I watched interview after interview in my quest to understand the whole Voldemort pronunciation question, I became more and more impressed with Jo Rowling as a person. I watched dozen of interviews spanning the decade and a half between the publication of The Philosopher's Stone and the release of the final film and there were a number of things about how she came across in her dealings with the media that left me rather in awe.

First, she is invariably polite and diplomatic while still standing her ground. Wait, when I read that sentence again, I realize I have named three somewhat different qualities so I will deal with each of them in order.

First, Jo is polite. She listens to the question being posed, she treats it and the person asking it with respect and she does her best to answer the question honestly, even when the question is stupid, invasive, inappropriate. She must have been asked the same questions hundreds of times and yet she answers them each time as if they were new and interesting. When she faces interviewers who seem to be in love with their own voices, she lets them prattle on rather than interrupting.

Second, she is diplomatic. I have seen interviewers try to tie her up in knots, upset her, catch her out and, in every case, she responds calmly and with a level of diplomacy that would do well in world politics. I have witnessed numerous journalists ask her blunt questions about her wealth -- questions which I consider to be horridly inappropriate and somewhat tasteless -- and she invariably provides an interesting, often funny answer that manages to point out the impropriety of the question without directly insulting the interviewer.

Third, she stands her ground. This ties in with "Fifth" below. Jo Rowling proves again and again that, when presented with a situation that she feels is problematic (especially when it involves children) she will speak out. Diplomatically, of course, but still strongly. One striking example of this came when she was speaking at the NY Press Club (I think that's when it was) and the moderator was reading to her questions from children in the audience. The moderator made some disparaging remark about one question and Rowling immediately challenged him on it and obtained an apology. In another interview, she was talking about the "begging" letters she receives from people and she made it very clear 1) that she cannot respond to such all or even many of such requests and 2) that some of them are completely ridiculous, like the woman who asked Jo to pay her a regular stipend so that she and her husband could attend the theatre.

Fourth, she clearly delights in being among children, whom she respects and admires as much as, if not more than, most adults. She appears to have infinite patience for young people and never shies away from nor disrespects their questions. In fact, she says on more than one occasion that children ask the best questions and she takes great care to respond honestly and openly to them. I was struck in particular by how often she remembers details about children whom she's encountered (in person or through the mail) in her promotional tours.

Fifth, she has a strong moral core. She is clear as to what she believes is right and wrong. As I said, this ties in with standing her ground. She is also very clear as to how much she loves her creation and how hard she will work to protect her characters and their world.

Sixth, she is humble. This is a person who has sold more books than anyone, who is famous around the world and who is as rich as rich can be, yet she doesn't seem to have allowed it all to go to her head. She recognizes that, when it comes down to it, she wrote a book. She wrote it well and she believed in it. But then outside forces took over. I didn't see a single instance where it appeared she was suggesting that she is a better writer than everyone else, or that she's smarter or harder working or more capable. She simply does her best and accepts (sometimes with awe) the results.

Seventh, she is smart. Her intelligence comes through in every interview. Not forcefully, not in an obnoxious, aggressive, I'm-smarter-than-you way. But it is clear, when you watch and listen to her, that Jo Rowling is a very well-educated, thoughtful and intelligent person. And that intelligence informs everything she says and does.

As I said, I've come away impressed. Sure, her wealth and fame have had an impact on her -- it would be ridiculous to think they wouldn't. But these basic aspects of her character appear to remain unchanged by her success. And that's something I can really respect.

Explanations and Rowling's writing prowess

I have been re-reading the first Harry Potter novel in French. As I think I've mentioned on several occasions in the past, I have found that reading the books in French or listening to them in their audiobook format really helps me notice things that I miss when I read them in English.

Well, it's happened again.

As I read the confrontation between Harry and Quirrell/Voldemort at the climax of Harry Potter a l'ecole des sorciers, I was struck by how expertly J.K. Rowling handles a common problem faced by writers of mysteries and thrillers: how do you provide the reader with greatly needed background information and explanations as to certain plot points while keeping the action moving and suspense building?

The challenge is all too common. As an author, you lead your reader through a complex, fast-paced plot, filled with twists and turns, and then you arrive at the moment of discovery, the instant where all things hidden come to light. How do you explain to your reader how the resolution fits in with all of the various twists and turns from earlier in the novel without losing the sense of urgency required to carry the novel to its completion?

And, in some cases, how do you make it realistic that the villain, now discovered, will be willing to divulge all this information to the protagonist?

Anyone who has read mysteries and thrillers, or who has even watched these genres on television, has probably experienced dozens of examples where this explanation challenge defeats the writer. How many times have you encountered a climactic scene where the hero says something like, "But, how did you...?" and the villain says, "Well, since you are about to die, I'll tell you..." or "Since I am now caught and have nothing to lose, I'll explain everything to you."

If you watch "Foyle's War" at all, you've seen numerous episodes that end with the bad guy willingly explaining to our favourite Deputy Chief Superintendent what he did and how he did it, once it's clear that he has been caught. It's one of the few true flaws in what is otherwise an excellent and entertaining show. The writers got lazy.

In other cases, the writer simply has the hero explain everything to a minor character in the denouement:

Watson: "But Holmes, I don't understand how Moriarity managed to accomplish this!"

Holmes: "Elementary, my dear Watson. He bought a ticket on the 8 o'clock train but stowed away on the 7 o'clock train so that he could arrive an hour earlier and commit the crime at 7:30, with his alibi tucked safely in his pocket."

Watson: "But that doesn't explain how he got his hands on the poor victim's letter opener!"

Holmes: "I think you'll find that there were two identical letter openers at play here..."

Etc. etc.

In simple terms, it is a key component of mysteries and thrillers that things happen throughout the plot that go unexplained but either provide clues to the identity of the villain or serve to obscure his identity. In order for the story to be satisfying to the reader/viewer, these unexplained things must finally be explained in a manner that supports the resolution of the mystery.

Yes, that's a very long lead up to what I want to say about Jo and her first novel. Sorry. But I did enjoy writing it, to be honest.

What I find so impressive about Rowling is the fact that, in her very first novel, she found an interesting and exciting way to explain the unexplained that actually serves to heighten rather than undermine the tension of the climactic scene.

How does she do it?

By making the explanations a part of the suspense. Harry is trapped in the room with Quirrell/Voldemort and the Mirror of Erised, desperate to keep Q/V distracted so that they cannot find the Philosopher's Stone before help arrives to save the day. So Harry asks for explanations. He asks point for point about every key event in the story about which he (and the reader) needs more information.

Isn't it Snape who is trying to get the Stone? Why did Snape try to kill me in the Quidditch match? Why did Snape want to referee the second match? Who let in the troll at Hallowe'en? Why was Snape on the third floor rather than helping to deal with the troll? Why was Snape threatening you in the forest? Weren't you talking to Snape in the classroom when you finally gave in?

And he got his answers. Delivered by a Q/V in an offhand way as he tried to figure out how to get the Stone out of the Mirror.

We, the reader, were caught up in the suspense and fully engaged with Harry in his attempt to keep Q/V from working out how to get the Stone. The questions and answers not only did not undermine the tension of the scene: they were actually part of the build up of suspense.

Brilliant.

I have often said that book seven is my favourite of the Harry Potter novels, with book three close behind.

But, when I think about which book is the greatest accomplishment for Rowling as a writer, I have to say it must be Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Despite the fact that it represents the first novel she ever wrote, it is a virtual masterpiece of writing. In it, she handles with seeming ease challenges that have defeated much more experienced writers.

Including the problem of providing explanations without undermining suspense.

Did Voldy grow mouldy in the Potter home?

I will admit it: I have not done my research on this so the answer to my question might be set out clearly somewhere in the seven Harry Potter novels. But the question jumped out at me this morning as I listened to Jim Dale reading the duel scene from late in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and I just have to ask it:


Voldemort says that, when his own curse rebounded off the infant Harry and hit him instead, it "ripped me from my body" and he fled. So what happened to his body at that point in time?


Was it left behind in the blasted Potter home? If so, what was done with it afterwards? Was it buried? burned? placed in a museum somewhere? Why wasn't it mentioned anywhere?


Or was it blown to bits by the curse such that there was nothing left of it to recognize, collect, bury even?


My guess is that, since, as Hagrid says in The Philosopher's Stone, some people believed that Voldemort died on that pivotal day but many others believed that he survived in a greatly reduced state, there must not have been any recognizable body left behind in the Potter home.


If there had been a body, after all, I would guess most people would have accepted that as proof the Voldemort was dead and gone for good.


What do you think?

"Harry Potter and Me" offers insights

In a 2001 interview with the BBC, Jo Rowling tells the story of how, after the publication of The Chamber of Secrets, she received a stern letter from a parent who basically told her the violent and scary ending of the second book was unacceptable and that the parent expected better from Rowling in the upcoming third novel.

Rowling's reaction is wonderful. She becomes very angry, even though several years had passed between the incident and her recounting of it to the BBC.

"I'm not taking dictation here," she says after a moment. "Do I care about my readers? Profoundly and deeply. But do I ultimately think they should dictate a single word of what I write? No. I am the only one who should be in control of that."

This is a pretty important statement for me as a Potter fan. It tells me that Rowling committed herself, early on, to remaining true to her own plans for the Harry Potter books and to avoid being influenced, dictated to even, by outside forces, be they her readers, her editors or even the films made of her books.

Two other highlights from this BBC interview, filmed between the publication of the fourth and fifth books:

1. Jo Rowling makes it clear that the film version of her books were, at least to that point, entirely outside her control. No matter how carefully she kept control over the writing of the books to herself, she was clearly willing to turn over complete control over the film versions to others.

She says, "The closer the viewing [of the film version of The Philosopher's Stone, the first novel] came, the more frightened I became, to the point where, where I actually sat down to watch the film, I was terrified because I thought 'oh, please don't do anything that's not in the book; please don't take horrible liberties with the plot'."

She concludes by saying of the first film: "I liked it, which was a relief, as you can imagine."

This may just mean that I can absolve Jo Rowling of any blame for the ridiculous liberties the film makers took with the plots of the later books, the devastation they wrought on The Half-Blood Prince and The Deathly Hallows especially. I can't imagine Rowling emerging from any of the last three films thinking that they had stayed true to her original books.

2. By that point at least, Rowling had written the Epilogue for Book Seven. She actually holds up the file folder for the camera, calls it the Epilogue and says, "In the Epilogue, I basically say what happens to everyone after they leave the school, those who survive."

That doesn't prove conclusively that she had the final plot completely figured out but it does indicate quite clearly that she spent a lot of time early on planning out where the novels would go.

Respecting the intelligence of young readers

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have started searching the internet for early interviews with J.K. Rowling as part of my effort to understand her writing process. I am interested in understanding both how she approached planning and writing such a complicated story (broken down, as it was, into seven separate novels) and to what level of detail she had actually planned the seven-book arc in the early years.


It's been an interesting experience, as much because there are really very few interviews available from the early days -- before or as, say, the second book was written -- as because of what I am learning from the interviews themselves.


For example, I confirmed what I had long suspected: the books are published under the name "J.K. Rowling"  because the British publisher worried that young male readers would not pick up a book written by "Joanne Rowling", a clearly female writer


Although it seems clear that she now finds the publisher's request that she use her initials silly and potentially problematic, Rowling has admitted that, at the time, she was so grateful that someone was going to publish The Philosopher's Stone that (as she told the New York Press Club in 2000), "I would have let them call me Enid Snodgrass if they published the book so I really wasn’t that bothered with it".


I love that comment for two reasons: one, it exemplifies what a fun and funny person Jo Rowling is and, two, it gives me a potential approach to understanding other questionable decisions that were made with regard to the Harry Potter books and films. For example, take Scholastic Books' decision to Americanize the books for the US audience and any number of the decisions made by the makers of the films.


Is it possible that J.K. did not feel she was in a powerful enough position to oppose Scholastic when it decided to rename the already successful first book The Sorcerer's Stone out of fear that American youngsters would not understand or be interested in a "philosopher's" stone?


That decision was made very early, apparently in conjunction with the awarding of a significant advance to Rowling for the American rights. It was made, in fact, before Joanne Rowling was JOANNE ROWLING, the international star writer with significant personal wealth. Is it possible she disagreed with the proposed Americanization but didn't feel like she was in a position to resist it?


From what I've seen, Rowling has a great deal of respect for young people and their intelligence. In that NY Press Club appearance, she actually chided the host for making a less than kind comment about the handwriting of one young person who had submitted a question. I cannot imagine that she would have agreed with Scholastic's contention (whether stated openly or not) that American youngsters would be scared off by the word "philosopher" in the title.


And then there is the decision to eliminate Snape's "test" from the film of that first book. I found it bad enough that screen-writer Stephen Kloves was permitted to make what I consider to be inexplicable decisions to change the Devil's Snare test and the winged key test (I don't think the film versions were any more vivid or visual than Rowling's originals); why eliminate entirely the logic test that Hermione solves?


Was it again because film viewers weren't considered smart enough to follow the test? Was it because they didn't think the riddle with the bottles could be translated onto film in an interesting way?


To me, Snape's logic puzzle was a key moment in the book, both in terms of the excitement of the moment (Hermione is able to keep a cool head under intense pressure) and in terms of promoting the characters and themes of the book.


We learn from it to respect the different abilities that Hermione and Harry bring to the table: moments earlier, Hermione had dismissed her own "cleverness" in deference to Harry's qualities of "friendship" and "bravery"; Snape's test serves to show how important Hermione's intelligence, her cleverness, her level-headed rationality truly is in pressure situations.


Sorry, I digress. I just wonder if, in those early days, Joanne Rowling felt she could challenge some of these decisions with which she must have, in some way, disagreed.

A new source for clues to an long-considered question

I'm a little disgusted with myself, to be honest.


As anyone who has read this blog will know, I am fascinated by the process by which J.K. Rowling wrote the seven Harry Potter novels, by how her planning for the series developed over time and was (or perhaps was not) influenced by other factors, such as the success of the early books, the making and release of the early films, and input from media and fans.


To date, I have limited my search for clues as to that process solely to the books themselves. And there has been plenty of evidence there.


But, today, for some reason, I stumbled upon a new source of information on this issue that so strongly interests me, a source that has existed and been available to me almost since the day I started this blog. I had simply never thought of accessing it.


The source is early interviews with Rowling herself. Interviews that were written or recorded while she was still in the process of writing the books.


I know, I know, I have also long proclaimed that I am not particularly interested in what Rowling has had to say since the books were released on how to interpret them or what happens to the characters after the time period covered in the books is over.


That's still, for the most part, true.


But I think I have been a bit of a fool not to avail myself of the mountains of information available in these early interviews when it comes to coming to an understanding of the process of planning and writing and the impact other factors had on the yet-to-be-written books.


For example, I found today this fantastic video on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn7nlfoMcwQ.


It features an interview conducted in a Scottish coffee shop with J.K. Rowling after The Philosopher's Stone had become a success in England but before it had actually appeared on book shelves in other European countries and in North America.


In the interview, J.K. talks with some awe at the size of the advance she has just received from Scholastic Books in the U.S. for that first novel -- I wonder if she knew at that point that Scholastic would require so many ridiculous changes to The Philosopher's Stone (including to the title) to make it more palatable to American readers?


She mentions her hopes that the book will be popular in Finland and she talks about how she is currently in talks with film studios about doing a movie version.


Most importantly to me, she makes several comments about her plans for the Harry Potter series. She says she has already completed the second book (The Chamber of Secrets), that she is working on the third (The Prisoner of Azkaban) and that she envisions the series as comprising seven books, with Harry ultimately achieving the status of being a fully trained wizard.


And she admits that the success of the first book, and the massive interest in it in the United States, caused her to develop writer's block for a month while she was writing the second novel. That's the kind of impact by outside factors that interests me. I also wonder: how much did her vision of Harry Potter, the other characters, the plots and the magical world, change as a result of those outside factors as she continued to write the books?


I have to watch this video a couple of more times to glean from it all that I can. And then I have to scour the internet for more interviews (whether in print or in video format) with Rowling that were conducted while she was still writing the books, when the completion of the series was still in the future.


It's an exciting thought. I can't wait to start on that journey.

Dumbledore's a crack apparator

Dumbledore's Study at the Harry Potter Studio Tour

When Dumbledore apparates to Privet Drive in the first chapter of The Philosopher's Stone, he does so "so suddenly and silently you'd have thought he'd just popped out of the ground".

When Mundungus Fletcher apparates away from Privet Drive at the beginning of The Order of the Phoenix (leaving Harry unprotected in the face of the Dementors), his disapparition is marked by a "loud, echoing crack [that] broke the sleepy silence like a gunshot". Later, J.K. writes that "Harry was sure the cracking noise had been made by someone Apparating or Disapparating."

In fact, the loud noise becomes closely associated with the act of Apparition throughout the remainder of the books.

So how can Dumbledore do it silently?

I would guess that, as the long-time Hogwarts Headmaster is a wizard of exceptional skill and talent, he likely solved the problem on his own to allow himself to appear and disappear silently. This would be a definite advantage to him when dealing with an enemy.

What do you think?

If not me, who? If not now, when?

I read, appreciate and enjoy the Harry Potter books and, to a lesser extent, I watch, appreciate and enjoy the Harry Potter movies.

But, as I have stated several times on this blog in the past, I have no interest in learning everything there is to know about Joanne Rowling, the author, or Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson and the other actors who starred in the films. It is enough that J.K. produced a series of novels of such power and fascination -- I don't need to delve into her personal life nor follow every drop of coverage the media offers about her.

And I feel the same about the actors from the films.

Lately, however, Emma Watson, who played Hermione Granger with such charm in the movies, is making it hard for me to continue to ignore her life outside the films.

Some time ago, in fact, I wrote about how impressed I was with her commitment to continue and, in fact, complete her university education.

And now it is her work for the U.N. and the marvellous speech she recently gave on the issue of gender equality and the He For She movement that has me impressed.

Don't get me wrong, I don't necessarily agree with everything Ms. Watson said in that speech. As someone who has spent 10 years of his life working against harassment and discrimination of all kinds in higher education, I was all too aware of the Eurocentrism that pervaded her talk.

And I find it highly ironic that Watson described the first hint she experienced of gender inequity as coming when she was just eight years old and was described as being "bossy" when she wanted to be given the same rights and powers as her male friends.

Why ironic? Because J.K. Rowling used exactly that word, "bossy", when she first introduced the character Watson played, Hermione Granger, in The Philosopher's Stone.

All of that being said, however, there was a great deal to admire in Watson's speech to the U.N., not the least of which is the fact that this world-renowned actress was visibly nervous as she spoke and admitted to the fact as part of her speech. It was clear that the issue means a lot to her and that she wished to be effective in getting her message across.

She spoke slowly, clearly and with a tremor in her voice that added that much more power to her message.

She made another important admission as well. She said, early on, "My life is a sheer privilege," and went on to thank all of the people who offered her opportunity and equity, people she called "the inadvertent feminists who are changing the world today."

Watson recognized that she has been afforded opportunities that few other women have enjoyed and she used that point to acknowledge the responsibility her good fortune placed upon her to use her position of power in our society to speak out about the issue.

Her main point, and the point of the He For She movement, is that both sexes share equally in the fight for gender equity, that men suffer as a result of the imposition of gender stereotypes, even if to a lesser extent then do women.

"I have seen men feel fragile and insecure by a distorted sense of what constitutes male success," she said at one point. And later: "Both men and women should feel free to be sensitive; both men and women should feel free to be strong."

I think there is a great deal of good in what Watson said to the U.N. and I am impressed to the highest degree that 1) she has taken on the responsibility to deliver that message and 2) she has done so with such openness, honesty and emotion.

I became aware of Emma Watson because she played a beloved character in a series of films; I am a fan of Emma Watson because of everything she has done, and continues to do, outside of her film career.

From 500 to five-hundred-million

While I love the Harry Potter books and, to a lesser extent, the Harry Potter movies, I am not one of those fans who wants to find out everything there is to know about the author, the actors, or the other people involved in the creation of the Harry Potter world.

I don't spend my time online, searching for the latest tidbit that has fallen from the lips of J.R. Rowling or Daniel Radcliffe or anyone else. Sure, if I encounter a piece of news related to the magical world, the books, the movies or the people of Harry Potter, I won't turn away but I don't spend my time actively seeking such nuggets.

That explains why it is entirely possible that something I write about on this blog that seems like a remarkable revelation to me might just be old hat to the more dedicated Potter fans who have stumbled across my humble offerings. Things that are new and exciting to me, I often discover, have already been recognized and talked over in the more public fandom.

Oh well...

That being said, I still feel a bit of a thrill when, in the course of my meanders through life, I run across an interesting bit of information about the Harry Potter books.

And exactly that happened to me today.

As a Father's Day gift, my dog bought me a trade paperback copy of Allison Hoover Bartlett's 2009 book The Man Who Loved Books Too Much (Penguin). Hoover Bartlett's book is a perfect gift for me (Marlee Marie knows me well!) and I'm very much enjoying the opportunity to read it.

On page 22, however, I came across the piece of Potter-data that has me quite interested.

Hoover Bartlett, in setting out a brief list of some of the rare books collectors look for at book fairs, identifies the first edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone as one of them.

Cool.

She also states that there were only 500 copies of The Philosopher's Stone printed in that first edition. I was stunned, to be honest. That was a piece of Potter-data that was completely new to me. 500 copies. That was it.

Unbelievable. That's why a copy of that first edition is now worth, according to Hoover Bartlett, $30,000 in American money. Wowweeee.

I'm a bit of a book collector myself. I don't go to book fairs or buy expensive copies from dealers but I do like to browse garage sales and used book shops and charity book sales, looking for books of interest to me. I've picked up several autographed volumes along the way, as well as a volume of poems by John Milton from 1674 and a first edition Ian Fleming, which is apparently worth a bit.

I guess I'll have to keep an eye out for that Harry Potter first edition as well. Not that I expect to find one here in my remote little corner of Canada but you never now.

And wouldn't it be great to own one of those rare 500, the books that represented in and of themselves a triumph for J.K. Rowling when she first saw them delivered from the publisher, the advanced guard, so to speak, of what would eventually become the Harry Potter empire.

And spawn adoring blogs like this one.

My scarf and the Harry Potter generation

Gryffindor forever!

My Christmas reading has forced me to set aside Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire for the time being. Over the course of the holidays, I've been lucky enough to receive nine new books and, since it is my policy to read every book I get as a present, I've been quite busy reading lately.

That's not to say that Harry has been completely absent from my life, however. We've been experiencing some crazy cold, windy and snowy weather out here, perfect for me to show off my ultra-warm Gryffindor scarf.

My sister knit this scarf for me a couple of years ago, following a pattern that recreated the scarves from the first movie stitch for stitch. It's a spectacular garment and draws a lot of attention every time I wear it.

For example, the other day I was standing at a street corner, wearing my scarf and waiting for the light to change, when a woman approached and said, "Your inner geek is showing."

I laughed and said, "So is your inner geek, if you recognize this scarf and where it comes from!"

We had a chuckle together and then went our separate ways.

Later the same day, I had a man stop me in the lobby of my building. "That's Gryffindor, isn't it?" he said.

"Yep," I agreed.

He shook his head. "I'm Ravenclaw myself."

Even later the same day, I was coming down on the elevator and a woman asked if my scarf represented "Mount Allison University or you know," and she then whispered, "Hogwarts?"

"It's Gryffindor, all right," I told her, holding out the Gryffindor crest on the scarf.

Two other people in the elevator nodded. "I thought so," said one.

The woman, encouraged, then told me she has been online, looking up the Harry Potter theme park and really wants to go. "It looks fantastic," she whispered.

What do these encounters tell me? Well, first they tell me that, even though it's now been almost seven years since J.K. Rowling published The Deathly Hallows, the Harry Potter phenomenon is still going strong.

And second, that even though my nieces, nephews and young friends tell me that Harry Potter is no longer in fashion for young readers like themselves, there are still a lot of people of all ages who love Harry Potter anyway.

Think about it. The Philosopher's Stone was first published in 1997, now almost 17 years ago. A person who was ten years old when it first came out would be 26, going on 27 today. The Harry Potter generation are now young adults, probably with children of their own.

And those of us who were already grown up in 1997 but loved the books anyway. Well, we're heading into middle age and beyond!

Harry Potter lives. But it's not so much the kids who are keeping it alive.

My Gryffindor scarf is proof of that!

Reflections on the Mirror of Erised

I have a quick question about the Mirror of Erised. You know, the magical mirror that Harry encounters in The Philosopher's Stone and that Dumbledore uses, later in that same book, to create an extremely clever protection for the Stone itself?

First, I should say that I think the Mirror is an amazing creation that J.K. uses rather brilliantly to give us a peek into the deepest secrets of two of the central young characters in the series. Through the use of the Mirror, Rowling very quickly lets us know that, for Harry, the lack of a real family, a loving family, exists as a hole in the centre of his soul. His greatest wish, we learn through this surprisingly simple technique, is to be a part of a family. This would become a driving force for Harry throughout the books.

Further, Rowling uses the Mirror to help her with the much more difficult challenge of showing us some of the issues that stand at the centre of Ron's psyche. Why is this a "much more difficult challenge" for Rowling? Because she uses a third-person limited narrator to tell her story: her narrator describes what happens in the stories from an objective position (the narrator does not actually take part in the action) but, for the most part, she limits her narrator to being able to see into the mind of one single character. Harry.

We know what Harry is thinking from scene to scene but rarely do we ever get to know what other characters are thinking.

So it is not so difficult for Rowling to help her reader to understand Harry because we are privy to his thoughts and reactions in relation to every incident that occurs. We learn about him by knowing his thoughts and feelings.

It is much more difficult for J.K. to help us understand the other characters whose minds are, for the most part, closed to us. We learn about them only from what they say and do, not from what they think.

The Mirror gives her a unique opportunity to let us into the mind of another character: Ron. When Ron stands in front of the Mirror, he describes what he sees and it is himself earning all kinds of different awards and accolades. This ties in with something he said to Harry earlier in the book: that he arrives at Hogwarts already knowing that he won't live up to the standards and expectations set by his older brothers.

So, from the Mirror, we learn that Ron yearns to stand out on his own, to emerge from the long shadows cast by Bill, Charlie, Percy, Fred and George.

As an interesting aside regarding Rowling's narrative technique, note that the reader "sees" what Harry sees in the Mirror (the narrator describes his family to us) while the reader only learns about what Ron sees in the Mirror from what Ron says to Harry about it. It's as if, like Harry, the narrator cannot see what Ron sees in the Mirror.

Okay, that's all a set up for this question about the Mirror:

Does the Mirror show Harry his family as it actually existed or does it show him his family as he imagines it to be?

The narrator tells us that Harry sees a large family, some members having eyes like his and his mother, others having knobbly knees like Harry. It is through these similarities that Harry realises that this is his family he is seeing and, in fact, that these are his parents in the middle of the group.

That suggests to me that the Mirror is not drawing these images from Harry's mind or imagination because, if it were, he would recognise them right away. J.K. would have written something like "Harry saw the family he had always imagined he had".

But, instead, Rowling makes it clear that, for Harry, this is the first moment in his life when he feels a part of a larger, loving family. He does not recognise them at first; the recognition comes slowly as he examines them.

So then we must conclude that the Mirror, after reading Harry's soul and realising that his greatest wish is to know his family, was able to find, somehow, images of his actual ancestors to show him.

A small point, sure, but that's what this blog is about: finding and considering small and large points about the Harry Potter world.

I find it interesting that, in the film version of the first book, the producers/directors choose to include only Harry's parents in the Mirror, to amend Harry's psyche from wishing to be part of a large family (which then ties him even closer to the Weasleys in the books) to wishing to know his parents (which makes it a much more personal thing).

It also makes the argument that the Mirror is only showing Harry that which it draws from his own mind because Harry's memory likely still retained images of his parents from his infancy.

If only memory charms were real...

I am reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone again. I can't even guess how many times this makes (10, 20, 50) but I still get something out of it every time.

And, in some ways, it makes me kind of sad. Why? Because I really wish I could be reading it again but for the first time.

Does that make sense?

A friend of mine is a big fan of the TV show "Breaking Bad" which, as many of you know, just came to an end with a big, much anticipated finale. This friend told me that the finale was "perfect".

Now, I have only seen one episode of this hit show and, to be honest, I didn't much care for it. I noticed, however, that several of the early seasons of "Breaking Bad" are now available on Netflix so I told her that, since she loves it so much and I respect her taste, it is my intention to give it another try. I plan to watch the entire first season of "Breaking Bad" and then decide whether to continue or not.

To my surprise, her response to this declaration was not one of delight, as I expected it to be, but instead it was simply a groan. I asked her about it: she said, "Oh, you are so lucky. I wish I could go back and watch it all over again for the first time."

We talked a little bit about this idea and both agreed that, often when you first read a book or watch a TV show that becomes hugely important in your life, you don't really understand how great it is and how important it will become. You don't savour it and, in fact, you don't savour your own experience of reading or watching it.

Weird, eh? But true, I think.

To be honest, I can't even remember clearly reading the first Harry Potter book for the first time. I do know that I read it while visiting my partner in England where she was going to school. I remember that I had heard great things about this Harry Potter book and that, in order to enjoy it together, I would often read it aloud to her.

But I can't bring back how I felt while reading it that first time, how it impacted me or even if I realised while reading that Harry Potter would become such a fun, important part of my life.

And then I think about my response to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. How I spent an entire year waiting for the book to be published. I was working at a University in Ontario and there was a group of us who were all Potter fans. We'd sit on our lunch hour or our breaks and talk endlessly about the first six books and what we expected to happen in the seventh.

And then, when Deathly Hallows finally came out, we all bought and read it in a single day. I remember being so caught up in finding out what happens that I completely neglected to enjoy the journey from page one to the end.

I remember reading the last 200 pages so quickly that, when I reached the end, dealt with the intense emotions it elicited, then caught my breath, I had to go back and read them again. And again.

But I worry now that I didn't really savour that first reading.

So, yes, as illogical as it may sound, I do now wish that I could go back and wipe it all out of my memory and read Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone again for the first time.

I want to feel again the wonder of discovering Harry's new magical world, the delight at the fullness of Rowling's vision of Hogwarts and its society, the intensity of the suspense as he, Ron and Hermione investigate the mystery of the Philosopher's Stone.

To be honest, I think I cheated myself the first time around. Oh well, you can't go back. We don't have memory charms that would allow me to erase the last 16 years and start all over again, fresh and new.

I guess I'll just have to do my best to enjoy the 20th (or 50th reading) instead.

Rowling is still Rowling in The Casual Vacancy

I have finally gotten around to reading J.K. Rowling's first adult novel, The Casual Vacancy. I am only about 100 pages in so far so I'm in no position to make any sweeping conclusions about it but I will say this: Rowling is still a wonderful writer.

Alright, maybe that's a sweeping conclusion.

But, whatever one might think about this down-and-dirty adult novel, you have to admit that J.K. Rowling writes beautiful sentences, crafts memorable descriptions and creates effective and affecting characters.

With that being said, I have two very early comments to make about this book and, sorry Joanne, but both involve me comparing The Casual Vacancy to your Harry Potter books. I can't help it. I'm a HP fan and can't help but to hear the echoes of your earlier works in this latest one.

First, at the beginning of Chapter Monday X of TCV, Rowling writes the following in the wake of Barry Fairbrother's death and its announcement on the Parish Council's website: "little knots of pedestrians kept congregating on the narrow pavements to check, in shocked tones, the exactness of their information."

Doesn't that remind you, just a little, of Rowling's descriptions of the way the wizarding world reacted to Voldemort's disappearance at the start of the Harry Potter series?

Early in The Philosopher's Stone, she wrote: "there seemed to be a lot of strangely dressed people about. People in cloaks...They were whispering excitedly together." And later, Professor McGonagall complains that, in the aftermath of Voldemort's historic first encounter with Harry Potter, "People are being downright careless, out on the streets in broad daylight, not even dressed in Muggle clothes, swapping rumours."

Not the same words, sure, but the exact same effect, don't you think? For me, it's kind of neat to see this kind of pattern in Rowling's thinking and writing.

So far, my favourite character in TCV is Krystal Weedon, the misery-hardened teen who feels her chance of escape has disappeared with Mr. Fairbrother's death. As I said, I'm only about 100 pages into this book and already I've developed a deep-seated empathy for this character.

Rowling is at her evocative best in chapter Wednesday I, the first that really takes up Krystal's point of view. And what a heart-rending chapter it is, as Rowling subtly, carefully allows us to see how devastating her coach and teacher's death is to this seemingly callous, hardened young woman.

As I read it, I can't help but thinking of Snape when he was young, a lost, lonely boy living a loveless life, with no real hope of something better.

It is a credit to Rowling that she is able to create such empathy for these apparently distasteful characters, that she can capture so effectively the devastating impact of poverty and abandonment on a young life. If Weedon (and what a great name that is for this character) is brutal and nasty and offensive, it is life that has made her that way. But that doesn't mean that she's not human, that she doesn't at some level of her soul recognise what she is and what she has become and hope for something better.

I'm quite enjoying The Casual Vacancy. I'll probably write more on it as I work my way through it.

How Rowling eclipses Meyer

First, an admission, then some thoughts.

The admission: despite the fact that I swore I would stop reading the twilight books after number two, new moon, I found myself in the Owl's Nest in Fredericton last week dropping five bucks on a used copy of eclipse, which of course is book three. I guess I'm a little bit hooked. And, surprisingly, it seems to have been the movies that did it, not the books themselves. I was impressed with the first two film adaptations and then felt I had to read books three and four before watching the films made of them.

Some thoughts: One of the great advantages that I think the J.K. Rowling series has over the Stephenie Meyer series is that Rowling adapts her style of writing to her maturing audience with each new book in the series. Meyers' books are all written for the same, young teen audience.

I can understand why Meyer would choose to do this, to be consistent in her style so that her readers would know what they're getting.

But I have a huge admiration for Rowling's realisation that her readers are themselves maturing in the interim period between the publication of her books. A reader who was thirteen when The Philosopher's Stone first came out would be 14 or so when The Chamber of Secrets was released, 15 to 16 when The Prisoner of Azkaban was published, and so on.

Rowling clearly understood that fact and made sure that the level and sophistication of each new book matched the level and sophistication of her reader. It's quite brilliant in its conception and really impressive in its execution.

Even now, I can enjoy the differing charms and attractions of each novel in the series. With Meyer, I find myself bemoaning the fact that each book offers the same tone, the same level of diction, the same sophistication of characterization and plot.

For example, the Bella Swan who works so well in twilight as a 16-year-old is less convincing in new moon as a 17-year-old and, as I'm finding out now, comes across almost embarrassingly infantile as an 18-year-old in eclipse. And the writing style doesn't mature either.

All of that being said, Meyer must be doing something right because I'm still reading.

Comparing Challenges: Saving the Stone versus Hunting the Horcrux

I read the ending of The Philosopher’s Stone the other day (again). And I was reminded, again, about how J.K. so effectively tailored her stories to the level of sophistication of her target audience.

As we all know, one of the most impressive things about Rowling’s seven-book series is that the maturity of each successive novel increases as her readers mature: the first novel is, in essence, a children’s book; the middle novels are designed for teens and young adults; and the final book, especially, is a complex, mature adult work.

There’s an easy way to see the difference between the simplicity of the early novels and the relative complexity of the later novels. Just look at how Rowling deals with two extremely similar situations near the ends of the first novel, The Philosopher’s Stone, and of the sixth book, The Half-Blood Prince.

When we get to the climax of The Philosopher’s Stone, we find our hero trio testing themselves against the various protections that have been put in place to defend the philosopher’s stone itself. They face Fluffy, Devil’s Snare, the flying keys, the Mountain Troll, the chess game, the bottle puzzle and finally the Mirror of Erised. After that, of course, Harry must take on Quirrell and Voldemort but let’s leave that aside for the moment.

Now this is a children’s book, remember, so none of the challenges can be too scary or too difficult. The tension must exist but it cannot be terrifying and, even more important, the protections they must get past have to be beatable. By them. As 12-year-olds.

In fact, since they are so new to magic as a whole, Rowling ensures that the solution to each protection is available to them, even if it is completely unrealistic that the people who put the protections in place would make them so easily overcome.

So Fluffy goes to sleep if you play him a bit of music. Devil’s Snare retracts from heat and light. Flitwick kindly leaves a set of broomsticks nearby to help them catch the needed key. The troll is already out cold. The chess game is winnable and the bottle puzzle provides sufficient information for a smart-enough witch or wizard to figure out how to move on safely.

Think about all of that for a moment. The professors of Hogwarts have taken on the task of ensuring the most powerful dark wizard in history, Voldemort, cannot steal the philosopher’s stone and use it to come back to full power. And yet they have designed each of their protections in such a way that it can be beaten. By children.

It makes no sense from a dramatic point of view, until you remember that this is a children’s book.

Okay, now fast forward to book six, The Half-Blood Prince. Dumbledore and Harry set out to steal the locket Horcrux from the cave. In this case, it is Voldemort who has set up a series of protections to keep intruders away from his precious possession. Does he set up his protections so that they can easily be beaten? Does he provide hints, clues or aids to help people get past his protections? No way.

First, he chooses a hiding place that no one should know about or suspect. It is only the fact that Dumbledore learned of the orphanage’s annual trips to the coast when he first visited the young Tom Riddle that allows Dumbledore to find out the general location of the cave.

Second, even though an intruder must know where to look and have the wherewithal to swim through turbulent seas to get into the cliffside cave, Voldemort hides the entrance to the inner cave using strong magic. As Dumbledore points out, only someone capable of seeing the minute traces left by a magical spell has any chance of finding that entrance. Once found, the intruder must then puzzle out how to make the entrance appear and open up, with no clues provided. If an intruder manages to get into the inner cave, he faces the lake, the inferi, the hidden boat, the killer potion, the inferi again, etc. etc. etc. etc.

Voldemort makes nothing easy. The only reason it is at all possible to get to the locket is because Voldemort himself may need to retrieve it at some point in the future. And I’m willing to wager that only a wizard as powerful and capable as Dumbledore, who does his homework and prepares meticulously for the task, could be successful at stealing the locket.

The first novel is a children’s book, so the challenges are manageable and even fun. The sixth novel is for mature teens and adults, so the challenges are extreme and terrifying.

Two very similar situations; two very different approaches.

I sometimes get frustrated with The Philospher’s Stone when I am faced, once again, with the fact that the protectors of the stone actually designed their protections to be defeatable. I have to remind myself that Rowling was writing for kids at that point and that her decisions in this regard are completely defensible.

When she was writing for adults, she treats the scenario in a much more realistic manner. It is clear that only Dumbledore is capable of breaching Voldemort’s defenses and, in fact, that he ends up dying in the attempt.

Again, wow. Great writing.

Petunia's on the Platform for an "Aha!" Moment

I love those “Aha!” moments. The kind of moments that only come because you know the books so well that you've got the seventh novel running in the back of your brain as you read the first one again.

Not that I want to be aggressively critical of J.K. Rowling. In fact, I think it's because she makes so few “continuity errors” over the course of these seven incredibly complex books that I actually feel joy when I find one. The fact that it's taken me about 20 readings of the novels to spot this one makes it even more amazing.

Take the following passages from Chapter 6 of The Philosopher's Stone:

    [Harry] pulled the ticket Hagrid had given him out of his pocket.

    “I just take the train from platform nine and three quarters at eleven o'clock,” he read.

    His aunt and uncle stared.

    “Platform what?”

    “Nine and three quarters.”

    “Don't talk rubbish,” said Uncle Vernon, “there's no platform nine and three quarters.”

    “It's on my ticket.”

    “Barking,” said Uncle Vernon, “howling mad, the lot of them. You'll see. You just wait.”

And later...

    “Well, there you are, boy. Platform nine – platform ten. Your platform should be somewhere in the middle, but they don't seem to have built it yet, do they?”

    He was quite right, of course. There was a big plastic number nine over one platform and a big plastic number ten over the one next to it, and in the middle, nothing at all.

    “Have a good term,” said Uncle Vernon with an even nastier smile. He left without another word. Harry turned and saw the Dursleys drive away. All three of them were laughing.

 Reading those two sections, you would believe that Aunt Petunia is as incredulous over Harry's claim that there is actually a platform nine and three quarters at King's Cross Station as Uncle Vernon is. No, Petunia doesn't actually say anything but she does first “stare” at Harry when he first introduces the idea of platform nine and three quarters and then joins in the derisive laughter when the Dursley family drives away, leaving Harry lost and stranded at King's Cross.

So we are given to believe that Petunia has never heard of platform nine and three quarters and is as skeptical as her husband regarding the possibility of its existence.

Now read this passage from Snape's memory montage in Chapter 33 of The Deathly Hallows:

    And the scene reformed. Harry looked around: he was on platform nine and three quarters., and Snape stood beside him, slightly hunched, next to a thin, sallow faced, sour-looking woman who greatly resembled him. Snape was staring at a family of four a short distance away. The two girls stood a little apart form their parents. Lily seemed to be pleading with her sister; Harry moved closer to listen.

    “...I'm sorry, Tuney, I'm sorry! Listen -” She caught her sister's hand and held tight to it, even though Petunia tried to pull away.

What's this? Aunt Petunia actually visited platform nine and three quarters with Harry's mother? She's been there and knows it exists? So why is she acting like the idea of a platform called nine and three quarters is ridiculous twenty or so years later?

My colleague suggests that Aunt Petunia might just be acting in The Philosopher's Stone, that she remembers platform nine and three quarters but has trained herself to act like she knows nothing of the magical world, especially when she's around her husband.

Maybe. But I don't think so. I'd be more ready to believe it if Rowling described Aunt Petunia as looking down, glancing away, looking solemn or something like that. But in both cases where Petunia is described in these passages, she is responding exactly the same way Vernon is: first staring, then laughing. When Rowling wrote The Philosopher's Stone, she intended to convey that both Harry's Aunt and Harry's Uncle thought the idea of a platform nine and three quarters at King's Cross was absolutely ridiculous.

And then forgot that when she came to write The Deathly Hallows.

"Diagon Alley' is a breathtaking introduction to so many important things

Having taken a brief break to read some Jane Austen (which I thoroughly enjoyed, by the way), I am back to Harry Potter again and reading Book 1, The Philosopher's Stone, for the umteenth time.

I love coming back to this book after some time away from the whole Harry Potter world. It's so fresh and lively and exciting. I even find myself getting a slight taste of how it felt to read it for the very first time, when everything was completely new, but in some ways re-reading is an even more satisfying experience.

Chapter Five, 'Diagon Alley', is a particular gem in this book, especially when the reader knows what's to come in the entire series of novels. That's not to say that this first glimpse of the magical world wasn't enthralling on first reading! I felt just like Harry way back then: I wished I had eight extra eyes to take it all in.

Now that I know the rest of the books so well, however, I can appreciate how important this first visit to the Leaky Cauldron and the world beyond it is to the development not just of this first novel but of the entire Harry Potter saga.

Any number of characters who would play ongoing and even important roles are introduced in this chapter: Tom, the barman, Dedalus Diggle, Ollivander, Madam Malkin and, of course, Draco Malfoy all make their first appearances as Harry discovers his own magical world and his importance to its people.

Interestingly, we don't learn Draco's name until later, just as we have to wait to find out what Harry plans to call his new snowy owl, a birthday gift from Hagrid.

J.K. also uses this chapter to lay down several important (and perhaps not so important) rules for the magical world, rules which would have particular resonance in later books and particularly in Book Seven, The Deathly Hallows:

• from Hagrid, Harry learns that toads are no longer considered to be cool pets by the students at Hogwarts, which later gives us a very quick insight into the character and circumstances of Neville Longbottom, owner of the infamous toad Trevor;
• from our visit to Gringott's bank, we learn how dangerous it would be to attempt to break in, something Hagrid reinforces on several occasions in the chapter; isn't it ironic that, as the saga comes to a close, Harry and his friends actually do try to break into Gringott's and, with a little help from a freedom-seeking dragon, actually survive to tell the tale; and
• from Ollivander, we learn four important lessons which will play key roles in later novels: first, that the wand chooses the wizard; second, that a borrowed wand will never perform so well as a wizard's own wand; third, that the holly wand that chooses Harry has, as its core, a tail feather from the same Phoenix that provided the tail feather inside Voldemort's wand; and fourth, that the Phoenix in question (which turns out to be Fawkes, Dumbledore's own bird) gave up only those two tail feathers.

And, as I've mentioned before on this blog, we get a wonderfully written opportunity to understand a little bit more about the characters of Harry Potter and the pale, pointed face boy he encounters in Madam Malkin's robe shop. The unnamed Draco introduces us to the division within the wizarding community over the issue of pure blood versus "Mudblood", while displaying a conceited, haughty character that immediately turns Harry off.

In just 17 short pages, 'Diagon Alley' sets the stage for what is to come, both in the novel itself and across the entire series. It's no wonder we readers almost fail to notice that Rowling has also introduced us, and Harry, to the villain of that first book, Professor Quirrell, who comes across merely as another Harry Potter fan in the Leaky Cauldron.

I found this chapter so impressive that I had to stop and read it again. Great writing. Fabulous introduction to so many important things!