If you enjoyed Secrets of Dumbledore, don't read this post

 The Secrets of Dumbledore introduces us to a long-ignored nephew/son, a new Grindelwald and a whole new magical world that is beyond our dreams and expectations.

The Secrets of Dumbledore does not introduce us to a tight plot, plausible characters or any kind of tension or even consistency with what has gone before.

I want to write that I watched SoD yesterday but I really didn't. After 30 minutes of focused attention, I found myself giving up any hope of finding a film deserving of that attention as the plot meandered, the characters blathered and the special effects took the front seat.

I started tidying up my den. I wandered into a nearby storage room to give it a much needed reorganisation. I talked to my sister on the phone.

This is a boring, lazy, silly film. Filled with scenes that go on much too long, even (long) scenes that aren't required at all. Filled with characters who some must find charming yet serve no real purpose: Jacob Kowalski? Seriously? Bunty Goodacre? Really? Even Newt Scamander is barely tolerable as a character.

I guess some Harry Potter fans are thrilled to see Minerva McGonagall as a young woman for a full 12 seconds. Or to hear familiar names like Rosier, Carrow, and Zabini attached to non-descript characters who appear and then disappear from the screen.

But really... SoD is a disaster.

Please, Jo, please. Stop. Respect the masterpiece you created in the seven Harry Potter books. Let them live on untainted by any more attempts to fill in the backstory, to cash in on the glory.

How many additional family members can you possibly discover? Now it's Aberforth who has an all-powerful child whom he has cast alone into the world.

How many more additional powers can you give to... well, every main character? Originally, wizards and witches, like all humans, were all relatively even in their powers and abilities. Albus Dumbledore, Voldemort, Bellatrix... perhaps a few others rose above the rabble. People with exceptional ability were recruited to be Aurors for the Ministry.

And even those people of exceptional ability, up to and including Albus and Voldemort, faced some limits to what they could accomplish magically.

In this new Fantastic Beasts version of pre-history, nothing is impossible. Nothing is even consistent. And it's maddening.

You worked very hard in the early books to establish what is possible and what is not, magically. To make clear the training required to accomplish even that limited set of possibilities, of how only truly extraordinary people like Albus Dumbledore and Tom Riddle were to be able to rise above and accomplish more. More, sure, but still within limits.

 And now you've just declared open season. There are no limits. And, as a result, there's no drama.

Albus is bound by a blood oath with Grindelwald until, suddenly, he isn't. Why? Apparently because Grindelwald tried to hurt a newly recognised Dumbledore nephew. But Grindy has hurt Credence before. With no apparent impact.

Grindelwald can bring animals back to life (I was waiting with bated breath for the word "Inferi" to be uttered). Dumbledore can create alternative realities in which he battles Credence. Fantastic Beasts can do fantastic things, even if we've never heard of them and their abilities just happen to suit the needs of the particular plot situation.

In the process, all tension, all suspense is undermined. If any major character can accomplish anything, then why should we worry about the outcome? Well, unless we are completely terrified that Newt will not be able to give his best-man speech at the wedding that is the subject of a ridiculous 20-minute epilogue to this already over-long film.

I could go on to talk about the over-the-top, smack you in the face allusions to American politics and the rise of authoritarianism but I think I need to go. Wash my hands. Cleanse SoD from my brain and move on with my life.

Yates finally explains why he didn't trust Rowling's ending

It was quite stunning, really. 

 I have wondered for several years what could possibly have possessed screenwriter Steve Kloves and director David Yates when they decided to change J.K. Rowling's practically perfect ending to The Deathly Hallows.

David Yates: Praying for inspiration

Now, after watching the recent Harry Potter 20^th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts special, I finally have my answer.

And it only makes me more incensed.

 

As you will recall, Rowling ends the Battle of Hogwarts in epic seventh novel with Harry and Voldemort, circling, circling, while the crowds of Hogwarts defenders and Deatheaters look on, mesmerised.

 

Molly Weasley had finally defeated Bellatrix Lestrange, the wizarding world has risen up to vanquish the Dark Forces and all that remains is for Harry to fulfill his destiny and bring down the Dark Lord once and for all.

It's a wonderfully tense and emotional scene. Harry distracts Voldemort from casting the final curse by telling him of Dumbledore's plans, both those that worked perfectly and those that didn't quite work out the way the Headmaster had intended. And then, as the sun breaks over the horizon, the two wizards cast their best spells and Voldemort, his own killing curse rebounding on him and the Elder Wand declaring its allegiance to Harry, its rightful owner, falls down dead.

Human. Finally and fully human.

All of the themes Rowling had been weaving so carefully through the books come to a point in this final scene, this final moment.

Perfect.

But not good enough for Kloves and Yates. Or, as it turns out, for Yates alone.

In the recent retrospective special, the director takes full credit (or blame, to be honest) for the ultimate filmic insult to Rowling's amazing work.

David Yates says this of the final battle between Harry and Voldemort:

Yates, fumbling the ending

When looking at the book, the final confrontation between Voldemort and Harry takes place in the Great Hall with a huge audience watching. And I really wanted something earthier and more intense and more visceral than that. Because these two adversaries were almost joined spiritually if you like in this strange Horcruxy way. I thought, wouldn’t it be wonderful if Dan just grabbed Raif and pulled him off this tower?

 

As they apparate, they are merged together. That deep connection that we had sort of threaded through the stories and the films you’d visualise in that moment before they tumbled into the courtyard.

 

As well as the physical challenge of making the films, there was that small pressure of thinking: you’re the one who is going to finish this. It has to go out on a high. It has to be meaningful. It has to resonate. It has to deliver.

The problem, Mr. Yates, is that the final battle as written by J.K. Rowling was meaningful, it resonates, it delivers. You should have trusted her. You should have recognised the poet and simply followed the plan she so masterfully set out for you.

In making the ridiculous changes you made, you took the soul out of the ending. You made that final confrontation mano a mano, a macho combat between two individuals rather than the final, almost anti-climactic moment where the common good, the collective society won out and the great monster that had enthralled and terrorised the world for so long was revealed as nothing more than a human being, around much had been built.

Harry didn't defeat Voldemort by himself -- he, Hermione and Ron hunted down the Horcruxes and one by one destroyed them, bringing Voldemort step by step closer to his end; Neville played a role, killing the snake, as did Hagrid, and McGonagall, and Kingsley, the House Elves, the Centaurs, the Weasleys, the families of the Hogwartians, the people of Hogsmeade and so many others.

Mr. Yates, you failed to understand what Rowling had built, so poetically, so artfully, over the course of the seven novels and, in making the final battle between Voldemort and Harry an epic battle, filled with flashes and explosions, fought in front of no one, you proved yourself an exceptional technician but no artist.

 

And you did a disservice to the stories were you entrusted to bring to the screen.

Cancel ALL year-end exams? Not likely

The Chamber -- film and novel

At the end of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Hogwarts administration announces that "the exams had been cancelled as a school treat" to celebrate the resolution of the Chamber problem and the saving of the school from the Basilisk that lurked within.

It's a nice moment... but, in the context of the entire series of novels, it makes no sense.

As we learn in later novels, Hogwarts puts students through two sets of incredibly important examinations (OWLs and NEWTs) at specific points in their academic journeys (after fifth and seventh years). Each has a distinct impact on the student's academic and professional careers and we see the hero trio agonize over their OWLs in The Order of the Phoenix. In fact, Harry, Hermione and Ron's experience in book five suggests that students begin preparing for their major exams very early in the academic year (and often the year before). The exams are important enough, and tough enough, that students need to work long and hard to prepare for them.

So there is virtually no chance that year-end exams for all students would be cancelled for any reason. Sure, it might be possible for the school to cancel exams for students in their first, second, third, fourth and sixth years but it is inconceivable that OWL and NEWT examinations would be cancelled in any year. From what we learn in later novels, the students would have to sit these exams at some point. So I think it is clear that the students who have been working so hard and so long to prepare for them would revolt against the thought that they would be postponed for any period of time.

I first noticed this issue when I recently re-watched the film version of the story. And I immediately blamed screen writer Stephen Kloves. In having Dumbledore announce the cancellation at the year-end speech, I thought Kloves was, of his own volition, taking things a step too far.

Then I checked Rowling's original novel and found this: "or Professor McGonagall standing up to tell them all that exams had been cancelled as a school treat". 

So I was wrong to blame Kloves (Sorry, Stephen).

But it does raise questions about how detailed J.K. Rowling's planning was when she wrote the second novel around 1998, a subject that, as a wannabe writer who finds Rowling's accomplishment in creating the Wizarding World absolutely amazing, is of significant interest to me.

It seems clear to me that, at the point that she was writing The Chamber of Secrets, Rowling had not yet developed in detail the academic journey students go on when they attend Hogwarts. The inclusion of the cancellation of year-end exams for all students in the second book is evidence that, in 1998, the concept of the OWLs and NEWTs was still to be created.

I am not saying this is a big deal. The seven novels are remarkably consistent and it is clear that, even if Rowling in 1998 had not yet developed details to the level of year-end exams, the author accomplished something remarkable in inventing such an incredibly detailed world as she went through the process of writing the seven novels.

But it is interesting to me and indicative of how difficult it can be to do what Rowling did so well -- plan a complex world and then write it over the course of a decade. I don't think it's possible to get every detail right in the early novels when the process of writing the later novels requires thousands of decisions, thousands of details, thousands of considerations as to what will make each book dramatic and effective.

That being said, I am going to read into ending of The Chamber of Secrets that only some exams were cancelled and that students facing their OWLs and their NEWTs were still required to sit their examinations.

Malfoy's murderous intent

Harry frees Dobby with a dirty sock

Lucius Malfoy attempts to murder Harry Potter at the end of the film version of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

In what could be considered a significant departure from the original novel, script writer Stephen Kloves chose to expose Malfoy's deepest evil much earlier than Rowling did.

The passage from the novel, which follows Harry's clever way of tricking Malfoy into freeing Dobby, reads as follows:

Lucius Malfoy stood frozen, staring at the elf. Then he lunged at Harry.

"You've lost me my servant, boy!"

But Dobby shouted, "You shall not harm Harry Potter!"

There was a loud bang, and Mr Malfoy was thrown backwards.

"Avada" shouts Lucius Malfoy, wand in motion

Malfoy lunges at Harry, perhaps in an attempt to beat him, or even throttle him, but there is no evidence in the book that Malfoy intended to use the Avada Kedavera nor to kill him at all.

In the film, on the other hand, Malfoy draws his wand and very clearly utters the word "Avada" before Dobby intervenes. Malfoy's intention is clear: to kill Harry. In front of a witness.

Why the change?

I think it is important to note that, when Rowling published the second novel in 1998, she had not yet invented (or at least had not yet introduced) the concept of the "Unforgivable Curses" and, if my memory serves, the killing curse (the Avada Kedavra) had not yet been uttered in the books. Rowling does not mention the specific curse in The Philosopher's Stone when the murder of Lily and James and Voldemort's failed attempt to kill Harry are discussed.

Rowling introduced the Unforgivable Curses by name and incantation in the fourth novel (2000), The Goblet of Fire, when Moody/Crouch Jr. showed them to the students.

So it is possible that it was Rowling's intention that we read that scene at the end of The Chamber of Secrets as involving Malfoy attempting to murder Harry before she had invented the killing curse. And, as a result, Kloves isn't really changing anything when he added the Avada Kedavara to the scene when he wrote the script for the second movie around 2007.

But I am not sure that's true. I am not sure Rowling's scene depicted a possible attempted murder -- killing someone with one's bare hands is an incredibly difficult, violent act, not one that belongs in a book written specifically for children and young adults. I think it is much more likely that Rowling either had no clear idea of what Malfoy's intentions were -- she knew she would have Dobby intervene so she didn't have to make that decision -- or she saw him as indulging in a fit of rage, with the intention of hurting Harry but not killing him.

If I am correct in this, we have to wonder why Kloves added the intent to murder into the film. By the time he was working on the script, the fourth book had already been published so that Unforgivable Curses had been introduced into the novels so the Avada Kedvara was available... but it's the intent that is important. In the film, Malfoy is willing to commit murder (or the Wizarding World's favourite son, no less) in front of a witness, within a stone's throw of Dumbledore's office.

And, to be frank, that makes no sense to me.

Nobody graduates from Hogwarts; they just leave

Have you ever noticed that there is almost no mention made of students actually graduating from Hogwarts in in any of the seven Harry Potter novels?

I mean, sure, some of the students we know (like Oliver Wood, Percy Weasley and Penelope Clearwater) clearly complete their studies and move on into the post-Hogwarts lives, and many adults in the books recall their days at Hogwarts fondly, but we never actually see, or even hear of, a graduation ceremony.

I went back and read the final sections of all seven books and, even at the "end-of-year" or "leaving" feast (the final celebration in the spring is called the former in the first three years and the latter after year four), there is absolutely no mention made of graduation, no congratulations offered to students who had completed their studies, no celebration of the class of students that is leaving Hogwarts to begin their careers.

In year one, Harry attends the end-of-year feast and Dumbledore's reported comments focus only on the House Cup and awarding additional points to Harry and crew.

In year two, Harry also attends and we only read about Hermione's return, Gryffindor winning the House Cup for a second year in a row, exams being cancelled and Gilderoy Lockhart not returning in the upcoming year.

The report on the end-of-year feast after year three is even shorter, with confirmation that Gryffindor won the House Cup yet again.

In year four, perhaps not surprisingly, the much longer scene focuses on the death of Cedric Diggory and the return of Lord Voldemort. No mention of the winner of the House Cup at all.

At the end of year five, we are not even sure if Harry made it to the feast since, devastated at having lost Sirius Black, Harry is first distracted by Nearly-Headless Nick and then by Luna on his way to the Great Hall.

There is apparently no final feast in year six since the focus is on the death of Dumbledore.

And, of course, there isn't even really a school year for Harry, Ron and Hermione in year seven since they are on the run for the entire book, returning only for the Battle of Hogwarts at the very end.

It's interesting that Rowling paid so little attention to the fact that seventh-year students were actually graduating from her beloved school.

And perhaps even more interesting that each of the last four books ends with a significant death: Cedric, Sirius, Dumbledore and finally Voldemort.

I don't have any brilliant thoughts or insights into why this may be but I do find it interesting.

Who wrote the Goblet of Fire?

Who wrote Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire?

Sounds like a silly question, doesn't it? Of course J.K. Rowling wrote Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Her name is right there on the cover, she has publicly claimed it and accepted credit for it.

But I am not sure that the J.K. Rowling who wrote the four Harry Potter book was the same person as the J.K. Rowling who wrote books one, two, three and five.

The Rowling who wrote most of the Potter books is a master story teller, a clear and technically perfect writer, a person who cares about the details as much as she cares about the grand themes of her work.

The Rowling who wrote The Goblet of Fire, on the other hand, seems to me at least to have been a different person: a person in a rush, under pressure to take advantage of the building success of her first three books and publish book four as soon as she could. 

The first three Harry Potter books were published in consecutive years -- 1997, 1998 and 1999 -- and each came in at between 200 and 300 pages. That's a remarkable creative pace but, considering the relatively brevity of the books and the simplicity of their plots, eminently reasonable. And these books are masterpieces, technically perfect in the details and creatively impressive in their overall achievement.

Goblet comes in at a whopping 636 pages but was still published only a year after The Prisoner of Azkaban. And, if you read it carefully, it is a sloppy sloppy book.

At a macro level, the plot is hyper-convoluted and nonsensical: once Voldemort manages to place Barty Crouch Jr. at Hogwarts with access to Harry, the entire Triwizard Tournament is rendered unnecessary. Crouch could simply port-key Harry to the graveyard on any one of the many occasions he had access to our young hero and, in the process, Crouch himself would not have had to be sacrificed.

Further, as I have pointed out elsewhere, there are significant problems with key points in this book, problems that should have been caught by Rowling in the writing:

1. Wormtail killed Cedric Diggory with his own wand and yet, when Harry's wand forces Voldemort's wand to regurgitate its most recent spells ("priori incantatem") in reverse order, Cedric emerges as if Voldemort's wand had killed him;

2. In the same "priori incantatem" scene, Harry's parents emerge from Voldemort's wand in the wrong order: it is made clear throughout the books that Voldemort murdered James Potter first, then was forced to murder Lily Potter in order to get to infant Harry, and so Lily should have emerged from Voldemort's wand first -- but James does; and

3. Rita Skeeter must have overheard the entire scene involving Harry, Dumbledore, Fudge, Snape, McGonagall, Sirius Black and the others in the Hospital Wing at the end of the book, including the confrontation between Fudge and Dumbledore -- once Hermione catches her at the very end of that scene, Skeeter could have been forced to write and publish the entire true story immediately so as to force Fudge to admit the truth. And render much of the plot of Book Five unnecessary.

Even so, it is in the details of the writing that the sloppiness becomes unhappily apparent.

I have chronicled in previous posts how skilled Rowling is at providing the reader background information from previous books in interesting ways while still moving the plot of the current book forward effectively. In Chapter 2 of the Goblet, however, she simply slaps it all into the story in long expository paragraphs. This continues in Chapter 3 and, despite a promising opening chapter, we are almost 40 pages in before the main plot even begins.

The book is also rife with the kind of small grammatical errors (for example, subject-verb disagreements, especially when she uses collective noun such as "group of students" but then uses the verb in its plural form "group of students were") that Rowling usually avoids, with run-on sentences (... and ... and ... and ... but) and with examples where she tells us something rather letting us discover it through action and dialogue.

For example, I opened the book at random and came up with this quote as an example of a run-on sentence:

'Lovely,' said Rita Skeeter, and in a second, her scarlet-taloned finger's had Harry's upper arm in a surprisingly strong grip, and she was steering him out of the room again and opening a nearby door.

 It is possible, of course, that the failure is on the part of Rowling's editors -- perhaps all of her draft manuscripts arrived at the publisher's office replete with errors and the editors whipped them into shape.

Whoever it was, the fourth Harry Potter book fails to live up to the exceptional quality of writing of the other six. And I think it's because Book Four was a significant rush job. Even though it is a mammoth tome, neither Rowling nor her publishers saw fit to take the time necessary to make sure it was of the same quality as her earlier novels in their rush to publish it for their adoring and lucrative public.

And the women shall lead

So Space Channel in Canada is showing the Harry Potter films all through the Victoria Day holiday weekend. I have them on blu-ray, of course, but I always find watching movies on television much more interesting than watching my own copies of them.

As anyone who has read this blog will know, I am not a fan of the movies that were made, loosely based as they were, out of J.K. Rowling's books. That being said, I have also tried to be fair and honest in identifying those areas where I feel the films have enhanced or, by necessity of the medium, adapted the books in a meaningful, interesting way.

I've just sat down in front of the television to watch the last hour of the second part of The Deathly Hallows. The first scene I saw takes place in the Great Hall where Snape demands that the students and staff of Hogwarts turn in Harry Potter and he, instead, emerges from the crowd of students to challenge Snape and, by doing so, set up the final battle of Hogwarts.

I don't love it, overall. But I love Snape in this scene ("ee - qual - lee") and I love the feeling of, I don't know how to describe it, triumph of having Harry emerge to challenge him and McGonagall step forward to defend Harry.

And it is not lost on me that McGonagall and Molly Weasley, two strong adult female characters, step forward to duel with Snape. And, even further, I love the fact the first people to step forward to protect Harry after Pansy Parkinson tries to convince the student mob to turn him over to Voldemort are women: first Ginny, then Hermione, then Cho Chang, then Katie Bell and Parvati Patil, and, as several males start to join Harry's defenders, Lavender Brown.

Add one more detail: Luna Lovegood is the one, in the film, who tells Harry not to bother to go to the Ravenclaw common room but to find, instead, the ghost of the Helena Ravenclaw to help him track down the diadem.

These are pretty strong feminist moments. While two men stand at the centre of the final conflict, it is women who provide the primary, immediate and on-going support to Harry in winning that battle. It's really quite wonderful... and unexpected, considering the fact that Rowling, for all the opportunities she had to fill the Harry Potter books with strong, dominating female characters, too often failed miserably in that regard.

While I love the books and tolerate the movies, I have to admit that, at times, the films are better than the books when it comes to their depiction of women.

Not So Trivial Flaws

Trivial Pursuit, Harry Potter edition.

Very excited to get this as a gift from a sibling and her family for Christmas this year. To be honest, I had never even heard of it but was delighted when it showed up under the tree.

"Please please please," I pleaded as I opened the box for the first time. "Let this game focus on pure Harry Potter..."

Trivial Pursuit, for those of you who don't know, was created in Canada I believe way back in the 1980s and was an instant hit, first in its home country and then around the world. After the original edition, with its six original categories of questions (if I remember correctly, Geography, Science and Nature, Arts and Literature, History, Sports and Leisure and finally Entertainment), there followed the Silver Screen edition (which focused on movies exclusively), the All-Star Sports Edition (which is self-explanatory) and then the Genus II edition, which returned to the original six categories. At some point in there, the original creator of Trivial Pursuit sold the game to a major American producer.

From there, a series of special Trivial Pursuit games were released, one for every major fad that came down the pipe. Despite this serious dilution of its core base, Trivial Pursuit continued to thrive.

It's a story that sounds kind of familiar to Harry Potter fans, isn't it? Humble beginnings, surprising success, a sell-out to a U.S. conglomerate and a rapid proliferation of spin-offs that move the "franchise" into a deeper and deeper dive for profit and further away from its roots.

Although the Trivial Pursuit, Harry Potter edition, has many merits -- it focuses on the original seven, true Potter stories and ignores the inspired mess of Hollywood insipidness and merchandising frenzy that followed -- it also suffers from two flaws:

1. It prefers the American versions of the original stories over the British versions; and
2. It prioritizes the events of the films over the events of the novels.

The first flaw is perhaps understandable -- an American game maker is attempting to appeal to an American audience and so uses "The Sorcerer's Stone" etc., the name familiar to its audience.

The second flaw is inexcusable. The books are Harry Potter -- the films are merely adaptations of Rowling's novels (and significantly problematic adaptations at that).

So when you face a question in the Trivial Pursuit, Harry Potter edition, like, "Who burned down the Weasley's home?", you know the correct answer is "no one" because, well, the Weasley's home was never burnt to the ground in the novels.

In the films, of course, Bellatrix Lestrange and Fenrir Greyback do set fire to the Burrow.

And when you get a question like "What Muggle game appears in the background of Mr. Weasley's workshop?", you know that there is no answer because Rowling never describes the "workshop" in such detail. Sure, in the film, you see that there is a pinball machine back there but that is merely a choice made by a set decorator, not a creative decision of the creator of Harry Potter.

The least the game designers could have done was to introduce each question with a qualifier -- "In the film version" and "In the original novels" -- to point out the difference.

Of course, I would love to have a TP game that focuses on the books alone. Or even one that has a separate category for the films: "Film Facts" or "Film Adaptations" or some such. But to have an HP TP game that actually treats the books like they don't matter?

Not acceptable. Not even remotely acceptable. But typical of the trajectory both TP and HP have followed since their humble but outrageously creative beginnings. TP and HP have both been sold out and are being exploited by soulless US conglomerates who care more about profit than art, generating cash flow than creating magic.

"I haven't read the books but I'm a huge fan" -- AARRGGHH

We've all had this conversation:

"You're a Harry Potter fan?" someone says to us. "So am I! I must have seen each of the movies a dozen times!"

You: "What about the books?"

Someone: "Oh, I haven't read the books. But I'm a HUGE fan!"

Doesn't that make you want to scream? Can we not all agree that, if you have not actually read J.K. Rowling's original Harry Potter novels, then...

YOU'RE NOT A HARRY POTTER FAN!

I don't care how many times you've watched those ridiculous movies. I don't care that you know the film dialogue off by heart and that you can name the actor who played the auror who is standing at the gates of Hogwarts when Harry trudges up, his face bloodied, near the start of the film version of The Half-Blood Prince, or that you think the portrayal of Draco Malfoy is simply dreamy.

If you have not read the books, even once, you are not a real Harry Potter fan.

That's why I can't stand Harry Potter trivia events these days. In North America, at least, the organisers' idea of a show stopper, a stumper, a question that separates the fans from the wannabes, is something ridiculous like: Who was the gaffer on the second movie? I don't know and I don't care. I can barely watch the films at all, not to mention studying their ludicrously long credits to prepare for a trivia contest. Ask me about Rowling's world, her characters, her plots, her details... don't ask me about the movies.

What is happening in American society is that the movies are replacing the original books as the canon of Harry Potter. This is ridiculous. The movies are fine as stand alone projects -- some of them are even mildly entertaining -- but they cannot and must not replace Rowling's works as the foundation of Harry Potter fandom.

Not only are the film versions significantly inferior to the books as stories, as narratives, as world-builders -- they are flawed even as films. They are internally inconsistent and self-contradictory. They have plot and character-development gaps through which you could fly a hippogriff and they undermine many of the most praiseworthy of the themes, of the creative decisions, of the original books.

I have described many of what I perceive to be the films' shortcomings in other blog posts so I won't rehash all of that now. Suffice it to say, in my Harry Potter fandom, if you haven't read the books, you're not a Harry Potter fan. Okay?

What is Harry's crime in the Half-Blood Prince?

There is something that has always bothered my about one of the key scenes in The Half-Blood Prince.

As you will no doubt recall, in the later stages of the novel, Harry sees on the Marauders Map that Malfoy is in a boys bathroom with Moaning Myrtle. Harry enters the bathroom and finds Malfoy leaning over a sink, crying, while Myrtle attempts to soothe him.

Harry takes no action, other than to stand looking at Malfoy. Malfoy pulls himself together and looks up into the mirror. He sees Harry standing behind him, draws his wand and casts a spell at Harry. That spell misses and a duel ensues.

The two are well-matched (surprisingly so, considering Harry's experience and training, but I wrote about that in an earlier post). After several shots back and forth, Malfoy attempts to cast the Cruciatus curse on Harry but Harry is a shade quicker, hitting Malfoy with the mysterious Sectum Sempra spell that he found in his potions text.

Malfoy collapses to the floor, bleeding profusely and dropping his wand. The duel is over. Harry takes no further offensive action but merely stands by as Myrtle screams and Snape thunders into the room to render aid to the bleeding Malfoy.

From what I can tell, Harry did nothing wrong. He walked into a public bathroom. He watched a schoolmate cry. He responded to an attack by that schoolmate. He avoided being tortured by that schoolmate (who was attempting to use an Unforgiveable Curse on him). He took effective action to render his attacker incapable of continuing the attack, without actually killing his attacker. He took no further aggressive steps once his attacker was incapacitated.

Where is the crime? Why is he punished? Why is he subjected to such significant vilification from Professor Snape, Professor McGonagall and even Hermione?

Malfoy cast the first spell and started the duel with no more provocation than that Harry happened to be standing there watching him cry. Malfoy escalated the duel by attempting to cast an Unforgiveable Curse. Harry defended himself once attacked and stopped once he had rendered his attacker incapable of continuing to attack.

Malfoy was forgiven for attacking Harry and forgiven for casting an Unforgiveable Curse.

Harry was found guilty of defending himself effectively from an unprovoked, serious, perhaps deadly attack.

Okay, I can understand that Snape, who hates Harry immensely for a variety of perhaps understandable reasons, might see this an opportunity to get at Harry. Fine.

But McGonagall? Once she heard Harry's story and interviewed Myrtle, wouldn't she intervene in support of Harry? Wouldn't she demand that Malfoy, once recovered, be punished (and likely expelled) for launching an unprovoked attack on a schoolmate and for attempting to hit that schoolmate with an Unforgiveable Curse?

And Hermione? Sure, she doesn't like the Half-Blood Prince's book. And sure, she quite properly chastises Harry for using an untried curse on someone like this. But why does she so thoroughly condemn Harry for his actions?

From a narrative perspective, on the other hand, I can understand this scene and its outcome. It provides action in the middle of a fairly static plot. It permits the duel between Malfoy and Potter that we have been hoping for since book one. It creates a reason for Harry to be forced to miss the final Quidditch match and sets up the climax of the Harry-Ginny romantic build up.

And, of course, if Malfoy were punished or expelled at this point, the climax of the entire novel would be impossible -- with Malfoy kicked out of school, there would be no way for Dumbledore to be trapped by Death Eaters on the top of the tower that fateful night.

So I see the value in the duel and Harry's punishment to Rowling as a writer but... the outcome of the duel still does not make any sense in the world of the novels.

Rowling would likely have been better to have the duel start less decisively -- Malfoy and Harry square off, trade words, then begin to duel together. And she should never have had Malfoy attempt an Unforgiveable Curse. It doesn't have much impact in the course of the action scene, it is unsuccessful and it creates the problem of Malfoy getting away with attempting to cast it.

Then, Harry could legitimately face punishment for using a curse without knowing what it did and, perhaps, for responding to Malfoy's less nasty attack with a ferocious spell that endangered the life of a schoolmate.

These are not major changes I am suggesting but I think they would make the outcome make much more sense and not seem so contrived.

Voldemort versus Grindelwald: Who was the more powerful?

Okay Harry Potter fans, easy question: between Grindelwald and Voldemort, which evil sorcerer was more powerful?

Perhaps not such an easy question. And, unless J.K. decides to find a way to have the two of them duel each other, probably not one we will ever be able to answer definitively.

But, for the sake of the intellectual exercise, let's look at the evidence that Rowling does provide in the seven Harry Potter novels.

The only direct comparison made in the books appears in Rita Skeeter's scathing biography of Albus Dumbledore, which is excerpted extensively in The Deathly Hallows. In her book, Skeeter writes: "The name Grindelwald is justly famous: in a list of Most Dangerous Dark Wizards of All Time, he would miss out on the top spot only because You-Know-Who arrived, a generation later, to steal his crown."

In Skeeter's estimation, Voldemort was the more dangerous of the two. Does that mean he was more powerful as an individual wizard? Not necessarily: from my understanding, it means only that, in Skeeter's highly untrustworthy opinion, Voldemort posed more of a danger to the wizarding community than did Grindelwald.

But Skeeter does make an important point: in any comparison of the two evil wizards, Albus Dumbledore is a useful measuring stick. After all, Dumbledore faced both Grindelwald and Voldemort in battle.

Of Grindelwald, Dumbledore himself says this: "They say he feared me, and perhaps he did, but less, I think, than I did him...Not what he could do to me magically. I knew that we were evenly matched, perhaps that I was a shade more skilful."

And, of course, Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald in their fateful duel.

So Dumbledore believed and then later proved that he was slightly more skilful (powerful?) than Grindelwald.

What about Voldemort?

It is common knowledge that Voldemort feared Dumbledore. This is a fact repeated over and over again, by any number of knowledgeable persons, throughout the seven novels, beginning in the first chapter of the first novel when Professor McGonagall says, "Everyone knows you're the only one You-Know -- oh, all right, Voldemort -- was frightened of." At that point, of course, Dumbledore admits from the outset that "Voldemort had powers that I will never have".

It is also a fact that Voldemort never sought a direct confrontation with Dumbledore: their duel in the Ministry of Magic took place only because Voldemort arrived not knowing that Dumbledore was there already and ignored Bellatrix's attempts to warn him of Dumbledore's presence in the building; and Voldemort sent Draco Malfoy to kill Dumbledore in Book Six and assigned Snape the task of murdering the headmaster if Draco should fail, rather than confronting Dumbledore himself.

(Another interesting question: did Voldemort at that point know that Dumbledore had been injured by a curse? I doubt it. Even though Snape did not know about the Horcruxes, I would expect that he would withhold the key information about Dumbledore's injury from the Dark Lord. Imagine how differently the story would have played out if Snape had, in his ignorance, told Voldemort that Dumbledore had been injured cracking open ring? Would Voldemort have put two and two together and realised that Dumbledore was hunting Horcruxes?)

It also important to note that Bellatrix, one of Voldemort's most trusted followers, believes that it is imperative that she warn the Dark Lord that Dumbledore is in the Ministry, even though, at that very moment, she fears for her own life and faces severe punishment for her failure to obtain the prophecy. In fact, she tries not once but twice to warn him ("Master, you should know..." and later "But Master -- he is here -- he is below --"). This suggests that Bellatrix knows that Voldemort would not wish to meet Dumbledore in the Ministry, or at the very least might change his approach if he knew his former teacher was present.

And Voldemort's own reaction to Dumbledore's sudden appearance is also telling: "'What --?' cried Voldemort, staring around. And then he breathed, 'Dumbledore!'"

So Voldemort's is afraid when he discovers that he must face his former teacher.

In the duel that follows, Dumbledore's focus is split between fighting Voldemort, keeping Bellatrix trapped and protecting Harry, and yet he is still Voldemort's match. The battle ends in a draw, with the Dark Lord choosing to withdraw (first by possessing Harry in a vain attempt to get Dumbledore to kill the boy and then by fleeing the Ministry) rather than continue to fight Dumbledore.

 It would appear from this evidence that Voldemort did indeed fear Dumbledore and that Dumbledore was the more powerful of the two.

I come to this conclusion even though Rowling writes, just before Voldemort possesses Harry: "For the first time, Dumbledore sounded frightened." From the context, I would argue that Dumbledore is not afraid of Voldemort at that point but for Harry. He recognises the threat to Harry and fears for his welfare.

I may be wrong, of course. Perhaps, in that moment, Dumbledore felt personally afraid of Voldemort. But even then, that does not prove that Voldemort was more powerful than Dumbledore but merely that, momentarily in a duel in which Dumbledore's attention was divided, Voldemort momentarily seemed to gain the upper hand.

So that leaves us with two Dark Wizards, both of whom feared Dumbledore and both of whom were unable to defeat him in a one-on-one duel. Grindelwald battled Dumbledore straight up and lost. Voldemort fought a distracted Dumbledore and withdrew.

It's not conclusive by any means but my gut tells me, based on the evidence in the novels, that Grindelwald would have bested Voldemort had the two ever duelled each other.

Concussions can lead to good things

A recent severe concussion left me warned off reading, watching TV, listening to music... thinking for two weeks. After that, I was permitted to read but only very simple books, only children's literature.

For some people, that restriction would be an absolute curse but, when you're a huge Harry Potter fan, it's more like a blessing. I was basically told that I couldn't go to work, I couldn't do any work around the house; I just had to sit around and read Harry Potter. What a nightmare!

So, in the next four weeks, I read the entire seven-novel series over once again, from Philosopher's Stone to Deathly Hallows.

An amazing experience. A testament to the greatness of these seven books and their author.

And I noticed some things this time around (I have read each of the seven books at least 20 if not 30 times), things about which I will have to write future Potter Thoughts posts:

1. J.K. does an amazing job of creating voices for her different characters -- this leapt out at me while re-reading The Chamber of Secrets with the newly introduced Gilderoy Lockhart and Colin Creevey especially;
2. The books have some laugh-out-loud moments -- the scene where the Weasleys get trapped behind the fireplace insert at 4 Privet Drive, for example, and many others;
3. Albus Dumbledore is unfailingly polite in all situations, a practice I would do well to imitate, even if his politeness sometimes hides humour;
4. I'm not sure if Rowling remembered how she designed Number Twelve Grimmauld Place in The Order of the Phoenix by the time she came to write The Deathly Hallows -- there seem to be too many inconsistencies and discrepancies.

 I also picked up the third of the illustrated versions of the novels -- The Prisoner of Azkaban. Like the first two in this fabulous series, this one is fantastic. Beautiful. Gorgeous. Surprising!

Magical Beasts are not worth finding

To put my cards on the table, I am not a huge fan of either of the two "new" Potter-world tomes. Neither the play The Cursed Child nor the film Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them fills me with a great deal of joy.

I have written earlier about some of my concerns with the play. I don't think, however, that I have written much about the film.

I watched Fantastic Beasts for only the second time last week. I read the script when it originally came out and then bought the Blu Ray of the film when it was released. I have pretty good equipment at home (50" 4K UHD TV and a topline Blu Ray player) so I figure I got about as good an experience of the film as I could possibly have, outside seeing it in iMax 3D or something.

And I was not impressed.

The story is overly complicated and yet meanders, the characters are sketchily drawn and the special effects, while at times impressive, remind me more of the original Ghost Busters than anything else. The CGI 1920s New York City looks about as fake as the CGI 19th Century Toronto of CBC TV's relatively low budget success The Murdoch Mysteries.

The film also seems to lack a sense of itself. Half the time, it comes across as a middle grade comic adventure (at the level of, say, The Philosopher's Stone) and the other half it is gritty and nasty and violent (The Deathly Hallows).

If that weren't bad enough, Rowling indulges in a great deal of revision of the world she herself created. For example, if I'm not mistaken, in the books, a Legilimens has to look into the eyes of the person whose mind they are invading -- in this film, Queenie can invade minds without even being particularly close to people. This power is played for cute in the movie but it's use here undermines its frightening power in the novels.

And then there is the character of Percival Graves. A highly placed and respected member of the MACUSA, identified as an auror on various websites, Graves has significant magical powers that go way beyond what the average witch or wizard exhibits, reminding the viewer of, well, Voldemort and his powers.

SPOILER ALERT: It turns out that Graves is, in fact, Gellert Grindelwald who, at the film's opening, is the subject of a world-wide search after he disappears in Europe. In the film, we see Newt Scamander cast a spell on Graves and watch as Graves (a dark haired Colin Farrell) dissolves into Grindelwald (a white haired Johnny Depp).

So we must conclude that Grindelwald is, at all times, Graves and that Graves did not have an independent existence before Grindlewald arrived in the US. Which raises the question, how did Graves rise to such a high, trusted position in a MACUSA organization that is, self-admittedly, on the brink of open war with No-Majs (Muggles in America), in JUST A FEW DAYS?

Grindelwald had just disappeared as Newt was arriving in New York with his bag of tricks. We see Graves already in a significant position in MACUSA almost as soon as Tina arrests Newt. Tina arrests NEWT on his first day in New York. That means Grindelwald created Graves and rose to a lofty position in MACUSA in a matter of days, if not hours.

Sure, you could argue that Grindelwald killed an already existing, highly placed auror named Graves when Grindelwald first arrived in America and assumed his physical appearance and his identity but how was he able to fool so many people without knowing anything about Graves' life, character, behaviour? And why wasn't his impersonation spotted, especially in an organisation as security conscious as MACUSA?

The plot is full of holes, I tell you. It's poorly designed, horribly paced and weakly presented.

I may still own the Blu Ray of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them but I doubt I will ever watch it again.

I just noticed that Rowling made a boo boo

People seem shocked when I tell them that I am constantly in the process of reading a Harry Potter novel -- that there is not a day that goes by when I am not somewhere at the start, in the middle or nearing the end of one of the seven novels by J.K. Rowling.

I've lost count of how many times I've read them (though conservative estimates place the number at 25).

So how is that I missed this?

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. In the chapter entitled "Veritaserum". Page 594 of the Canadian first edition, published in 2000. Eighth line from the bottom.

Barty Crouch Jr. has already transformed back into himself after being stunned by Dumbledore and deprived of his next dose of Polyjuice Potion. The real Alastor "Mad Eye" Moody has been discovered in the bottom of his own magical chest and Barty Crouch Jr., under the influence of three drops of Veritaserum, is explaining everything to Dumbledore, McGonagall, Snape, Harry and Winky, the house elf.

Crouch's transformation back into himself is complete and Rowling has been referring to him as "Crouch" for almost an entire page. Then Dumbledore asks him:

'How did your father subdue you?'

And, in the eighth last line of page 594, Rowling writes the response:

'The Imperius curse,' Moody said. 'I was under my father's control....'

"Moody said" is the tag. Not "Crouch said". "Moody said". Even though Crouch has fully transformed back into himself and Rowling has been referring to him as "Crouch" for more than a page, somehow "Moody" sneaks back in when it is clearly Crouch who is speaking.

How did I miss that error in all my 24 previous readings of the book? How did Rowling miss it in her original writing of the scene, in her numerous reviews and revisions? How did her editors miss it?

To be frank, I missed it because I am always, even after more than 20 readings, so caught up in the action at this point that I speed read the entire chapter. This is the first time I've been able to slow myself down enough to notice things... including continuity errors.

Wow. I'm sure a million other Harry Potter fans have spotted this error in the past but it's the first time I've seen it. It's like Harry Potter is new to me again... after 24 readings.

Another side to Rowling's talent

Have you ever tried to write a screenplay? Or even a play? I have and it is NOT EASY. Writing stories and novels isn't easy either but at least they use the same kinds of sentences and paragraphs and stuff that we learned in school.

Screenplays are truly little bits of normal writing jammed between other nonsensical stuff that seems more like code than anything else. And then there is the structure of a screenplay -- sure, it has the same basic elements (beginning, middle and end) that a normal story has but it also requires a whole pile of other bits that they didn't teach us about in the classroom.

That's why it's amazing to me that J.K. Rowling's screenplay for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is so impressive. A master story teller in traditional prose formats -- her novels include not just, well, novels but also short stories, fables, news articles, magazine articles, advertising copy, and much more in terms of the forms of prose writing, all beautifully written -- J.K. seems to move effortlessly into the world of screenwriting as well.

To be honest, I don't really think Fantastic Beasts is a fabulous screenplay but it is indeed very very good, an amazing accomplishment for a novelist like Rowling. Sure, she probably got lots of help from the professional screenwriters who worked on the Potter films but still -- she has produced a credible, professional quality, exciting first screenplay.

I finally broke down and read the script after I missed Fantastic Beasts when it came out in theatres. My town is so small that films, even major motion pictures, only stick around for a week or two and, if you're distracted by life at the time, you're bound to miss out. I thought I could hold out on reading the script until the film came out on  Blu Ray but... nope. I fell about three weeks short.

And, to be honest, I'm glad I did read it. I have gained a new appreciation for Rowling as a writer (a multi-talented writer) and I now have a clear idea of the story and the characters as I wait, with a great deal of impatience all of a sudden, to get my hands on the Blu Ray to see how this fun, lively, face-paced script was brought to life.

With The Cursed Child, I wanted to see the play to redeem what I consider to be an awful script; with Fantastic Beasts, I want to see the film to see this amazing story on the big (TV) screen.

At last, my Hogwarts acceptance letter

I have been accepted to Hogwarts School, the best school of witchcraft and wizardry in the world. That's what the letter I received today says. It's about four decades too late but at least it got here.

 In fact, I got the whole Hogwarts acceptance package: the letter, the list of supplies and books, the train ticket. Very very exciting. I even tweeted to J.K. Rowling to ask her help in finding the Leaky Cauldron and the entrance to Diagon Alley -- I have a lot to buy and I'm not sure Canada has its own magical mall.

I believe that my sister Lynn created these exquisite reproductions (because, let's face it, they're not real... unfortunately) and they have instantly become one of my favourite Harry Potter items, alongside my Gryffindor scarf (also hand-crafted by Lynn), my Grim tea cup and my Harry Potter shelf, all hand-made, one-of-a-kind items.

And these are perfect reproductions. Gorgeous and perfect in every way. The envelope came tied with a string, with the red Hogwarts seal on the back. And, if I'm not mistaken, the letter is perfect, right down to the signatures, while nothing is missed from the supply list enclosed.

I especially love the train ticket, which is plasticised slightly, to keep it firm and clean. I'm not sure everyone in the world would be as enthralled by this little package as I am but I guess that's the nature of presents: they are intended to please and delight the receiver. And, if my sister's excited anticipation of my opening the gift over the past two weeks is any indication, she's as delighted by this as I am!

A Grim tea cup to add to my collection

Everyone was staring, transfixed, at Professor Trelawney, who gave the cup a final turn, gasped, and then screamed.
There was another tinkle of breaking china. Neville had smashed his second cup. Professor Trelawney sank into a vacant armchair, her glittering hand on her heart and her eyes closed.
'My dear boy -- my poor dear boy -- no -- it is kinder not to say -- no -- don't ask me...'
'What is it, Professor?" said Dean Thomas at once. Everyone had got to their feet, and slowly, they crowded around Harry and Ron's table, pressing close to Professor Trelawney's chair to get a good look at Harry's cup.
'My dear,' Professor Trelawney's huge eyes opened dramatically, 'you have the Grim.'

The Grim in my teacup

In our first introduction to the memorable Professor of Divination, Sybil Trelawney, we experience the second prediction that Trelawney makes about Harry.

The first, of course, was the prophecy offered up before Harry was even born that set into motion the tortured relationship that was to develop between the Dark Lord and our orphan hero.

The second one, the prophecy of Harry's death in this scene from The Prisoner of Azkaban, was perhaps not so meaningful. Sure, it tied in with Harry's many sightings of a strange black dog that was haunting his life at that time but it was certainly not very accurate.

My HP shelf

The tea leaves might have looked like The Grim -- the giant spectral dog that haunts church yards which is an omen of death -- to Trelawney but they certainly didn't give notice of Harry's imminent demise.

I write of this section today not because I have any great insight into what is happening in the scene but simply to introduce my latest Harry Potter acquisition: a handmade Grim tea up, with Trelawney's immortal words on the saucer. It's gorgeous and so really very cool. It was made by the young friend of my friend Steph and was a gift to me at Christmas this year.

I just love it. And it fits in so nicely on the lowest level of my handcrafted Harry Potter shelf, right next to my hand knit Griffyndor scarf!

Wondering who killed Ariana Dumbledore

This priori incantatem spell is still hanging around in the back of my head.

A useful little spell, isn't it? It causes a wand to spew forth, in reverse chronological order, all of the spells it has cast in the past. How far back it goes, I don't think is ever established, but it can be used in a variety of ways to understand how events transpired, to interact with people who died under that wand, to prove guilt or innocence even.

Useful, yes, but not used often enough, I think.

For example, the events of The Half-Blood Prince and The Deathly Hallows establish very clearly that Albus Dumbledore is haunted by the death of his sister, Ariana, and the thought, the fear that he himself could possibly have cast the spell that killed her.

His fear and remorse show themselves when he drinks the potion that protects the Slytherin's Locket in the middle of the lake in the cave by the seaside. He becomes emotional again in the "King's Cross" scene at the end of The Deathly Hallows, telling Harry that he fears that he himself cast the spell that killed Ariana.

Which begs the question: why, at some point in the 100 or so years between the Ariana's death and Dumbledore's own demise, did he not think simply to perform priori incantatem on his own wand and perhaps on Aberforth's as well. I will accept that Dumbledore would not have had access to Grindelwald's original wand but, if he tested both his own and his brother's, that should be sufficient to prove who cast the killing spell.

Okay, if priori incantatem is time-limited (or limited in the number of spells it can spew forth), perhaps Dumbledore could run out of time... but why wouldn't he think of it immediately after Ariana's death? He was a masterful wizard at the time. Perhaps he was too distraught and, by the time he thought of using this spell on his own wand, he had run out of time.

The situation begs another question: in all of Harry Potter lore, we have seen only one spell that kills its target (Avada Kedavra) -- does Dumbledore's reaction to his possible part in Ariana's death mean that he, Aberforth and Grindelwald were duelling to the death that fateful day?

Were all three of them throwing the Avada Kedavra around as they fought a boys' fight?

Or is is possible that an already weakened Ariana succumbed to a lesser spell?

Ah, the stories Bellatrix's wand could have told!

So I'm reading The Deathly Hallows in French and I have come to the scene at Shell Cottage where our hero trio are about to apparate to Diagon Alley to attempt to break into Gringott's.

Hermione expresses her horror at having to carry the captured wand of Bellatrix Lestrange. Harry tells her it should help her live the part. Ron tells her to imagine all the powerful magic that has been done with that wand.

Ron's comment only serves to make matters worse as Hermione points out, with absolute disgust, that  Bellatrix had used that exact wand to torture Neville's parents into madness and then to kill Sirius Black.

Harry's immediate reaction is one of revulsion. He expresses the wish to throw the wand away, to get as far from it as he possibly can.

It's too bad he didn't remind himself of Priori Incantatem, the spell that forces a wand to reveal the spells it has previously cast in reverse order.

We saw Priori Incantatem in the graveyard in The Goblet of Fire when Voldemort returns to bodily form -- Harry's wand forces the Dark Lord's wand to spit out shadows (albeit talking shadows) of its most recent victims, including (I believe erroneously) Cedric Diggory and Harry's parents -- and, earlier in the seventh novel, Harry reminds Hermione and Ron that, by using Priori Incantatem on Hermione's lost wand, the Death Eaters will soon learn that Harry's original wand had been broken.

In that graveyard scene, remember, the shadows that emerged from Voldemort's wand of his recent victims were actually able to speak to Harry and to take steps to protect him as he made his escape. In a way, while simply shadows of spells past, they were also thinking beings.

So it's too bad that Harry doesn't think to perform Priori Incantatem on Bellatrix's wand so as to get a chance to speak, at least briefly, to his godfather. I'm not sure what good it would have done any one, to be honest -- it's not like Sirius would have any great insights into the Deathly Hallows or how to break into Gringott's or what the last three Horcruxes were -- but it might have given Harry, Hermione and Ron a welcome moment with their beloved mentor.

A worthy home for Harry Potter

Wand on top, movies, books, special books

If you are like me, your Harry Potter collection is getting a little bit out of hand. Even if you limit yourself to the original seven novels (and eight movies), even if you refuse to purchase each new edition of the books as they are released, your probably are starting to amass quite a pile of Harry Potter related stuff.

What do you do?

Naturally, you choose a book shelf some where in your house and put all of your HP books there. You might even put your DVDs or Blu Rays there. But it doesn't seem enough, does it?

Are you really showing your allegiance to Harry and the wondrous Rowling World by shelving her books beside your copies of The Hunger Games? No way.

Feeling that I was doing a disservice to my Harry Potter passion and realizing that I wasn't showing my collection to advantage, I decided to commission a carpenter friend Robb to build me a custom-made, carefully measured Harry Potter book shelf.

It's oak, stained dark to look like the wood from which the Nimbus 2000's handle is made, and it has beautifully carved accents: the glasses and lightning scar at the top, the HP on the sides and even the Nimbus 2000 logo hidden on the right of the bottom shelf.

I just got the final product yesterday and, as you can see by the photos, it is spectacular.

Note the HP carved on the sides

My official HP wand holds the place of honour, on the top shelf, just below the inscribed glasses and lightning scar. On the second shelf, you'll find the Blu Ray movies and all of the Jim Dale audio books on CD. Below that, the books themselves: seven novels in English (plus a second copy of The Deathly Hallows that I literally read to pieces), the seven novels in Menard's wonderful French translations, and finally the ancillary canonical books from Rowling herself, accompanied by a couple of other odd Potter-related works.

The bottom shelf is still a work in progress. On the left, a limited special edition hard cover copy of The Philosopher's Stone that I picked up at the Studio Tour in England. In the centre, the first of the illustrated versions of the Harry Potter novels (the shelf is scaled for this book -- I can only trust that the next six will be the same dimensions) and finally my studio tour guide book. I plan to add my hand-knit Gryffindor scarf (thanks Lynn) to the bottom shelf as well, at least until the other illustrated books join the collection.

I have to admit, I'm arguing with myself as to whether or not I should add my copy of The Cursed Child to the shelf. It was such an awful piece of work, it wasn't written by J.K. herself and I don't consider it canonical so I probably won't honour it by placing it here.

That leaves the question: do I add the script for Fantastic Beasts when it comes out? It was written by Rowling so it should probably be considered both canonical and worthy of inclusion on my shelf. But I'll have to think about that.

To be honest, I'm not even sure the film versions deserve to be there but many HP fans might consider their exclusion to be nothing short of heretical.