The year of behaving badly

I have written over and over again on the subject of how hard I find it to read The Order of the Phoenix. This is a gloomy, claustrophobic novel in which no one... and I mean no one... behaves well.


Of course, the antagonists -- Dolores Umbridge, Draco and Lucius Malfoy, Cornelius Fudge, even Percy Weasley, Voldemort -- are insufferable. That's to be expected.


But even the so-called "good guys" are not at their best.


Mundungus Fletcher leaves his post and permits Harry to be attacked by Dementors.


Sirius Black is childish and moody throughout most of the book. putting his own unhappiness ahead of the interests of his godson, Harry.


Mr. and Mrs. Weasley treat the teenagers like toddlers and refuse to let them in on what's going on with the Order of the Phoenix. Further, they fail entirely to prepare Harry adequately for the trial at the Ministry.


Professor McGonagall seems oblivious to Harry's suffering while at Hogwarts, continually chastising him for letting Umbridge upset him rather than helping him, counseling him on why his suffering is necessary and how he can better endure it.


Professor Dumbledore's behaviour is inexplicably abhorrent. He literally abandons Harry in his hour of need and leaves Harry to suffer the horrors of Umbridge without any support whatsoever. Okay, Dumbledore worries that Voldemort will use the connection between his mind and Harry's to try to spy on Dumbledore so the Headmaster doesn't want to interact with Harry face to face... but why not send him a series of letters, explaining the concerns, outlining what's happening and guiding him as to how to proceed?


You would think that, through all this, Ron and Hermione at least would behave appropriately. But Ron spends the book caught up in his own Quidditch-inspired malaise while Hermione... well, Hermione is awe-inspiring in her insipidness.


Every time the young people get a chance to speak to an Order member and obtain much needed reassurance and guidance, Hermione loses focus completely and goes off on Elf-rights tangents. She knows Harry is desperate for counsel from Sirius and yet, when Harry's godfather appears one evening in the common room fire, Hermione makes the whole, time-limited interaction about how Sirius shouldn't be taking risks and how Sirius should be treating Kreacher better.


It doesn't seem to occur to her that Harry really really really needs to talk to his godfather.


Sirius' own petulant pouting during that conversation is also way over the top.


Hermione is at her worst in Umbridge's Defence Against the Dark Arts classes. While Harry must be faulted for his own inability to control his temper in the face of the obnoxious Ministry hag, Hermione is the one who set matches to gasoline by challenging Umbridge in not one but two consecutive classes.


What is she thinking? What can she possibly be thinking? Hermione is smart enough to understand that the only way she, Harry and the rest of the students can possibly survive Umbridge and the Minister's interference is to keep their heads down and stay quiet. Yet, she goes out of her way to create conflict and confrontation and then has the unmitigated gall to admonish Harry for getting caught up in the fire she herself has created.


There are times I wonder if J.K. Rowling went too far in this book, if she let the narratorial imperative of isolating and abusing Harry in the first half of the novel cause her to undermine the consistency of her carefully established central characters.


The fact of the matter is, Dumbledore is not the insensitive clod that he is portrayed as in The Order of the Phoenix; Hermione is smarter and more sensible than the character who appears in this book.


It is possible that, in her understandable campaign to put Harry into a terrible, lonely, vulnerable and suffering situation in his fifth year at Hogwarts, Rowling lost track of who her characters really are?

Umbridge a Death Eater?

This will show you how really attentive a reader I am -- I just realized, as I re-read the first chapter of The Order of the Phoenix for the 20-somethingth time, that Dolores Umbridge sent the Dementors to Little Whinging to kill Harry Potter on that hot summer night.


She wasn't playing around. She took it upon herself, without any consultation with Cornelius Fudge or anyone else, to send the most heinous of magical creatures into Surrey to kill an innocent 15-year-old boy who had committed no crime but witness the rebirth of the Dark Lord and return to tell about it.


Woweee.


I mean, these Dementors meant business. They arrived, attacked and were ready to perform the Kiss on Dudley, an even more innocent bystander in all this, without wasting any time at all.


We only learn at the end of the novel that it was Umbridge who, on her own initiative, sent them to attack Harry but, in retrospect, this action says a great deal about this delightful lady.


She could not have known that Harry was so capable with the old Patronus Charm. We can't give her the benefit of the doubt by arguing that she sent the Dementors to force Harry to perform magic so that the Ministry would then have some grounds to snap his wand and expel him from Hogwarts.


She was trying to kill him.


Why? For upsetting Fudge? For making him look bad?


Is it possible that Umbridge is actually a Death Eater who is simply never identified as such? That she is acting on the Dark Lord's orders, trying to kill the Boy Who Lived after Voldemort failed to do so in the graveyard?


If she isn't a Death Eater, Doesn't her decision to try to have the Dementors kill Harry seem like a bit of an over-reaction under the circumstances? To kill Harry just because he represents the only real evidence available that Voldemort has returned?

Keeping Harry safe from Sirius Black

Let's see now. You are aware that Sirius Black is bent on murdering Harry Potter. You know exactly where Harry Potter is every moment of every day. And you know, after several close calls, that Sirius Black has somehow found a way to get passed Hogwarts' increased security and into the Gryffindor Common Room.


If you are Albus Dumbledore, wouldn't you increase the level of security around Harry himself?


From what I can see in re-reading The Prisoner of Azkaban, there is at no time a focus by school officials on keeping Harry, personally, safe. Sure, they batten down the hatches at the school and bring in the Dementors but they never say to themselves: maybe Harry should be moved to a more secure location when he sleeps, say in Dumbledore's office or somewhere like that.


It's odd. I know, it certainly wouldn't help the suspense much if Harry were completely secure and out of danger. But it would make better sense.

A clever opening scene

The first chapter of The Half-Blood Prince is, for me, more evidence of the kind of clever, thoughtful writer J.K. Rowling really is.

Coming off what turned out to be the longest novel in the series, she sat down to write THBP facing the challenge of getting across a great deal of information to her reader while not falling into the trap of providing a long, drawn out expository passage with little action to open the novel.

So she created something entirely new, something that very cleverly incorporates small pieces of plot that she had dropped into earlier novels and that her readers probably didn't even notice the first time around.

Rowling created the relationship between the Muggle Prime Minister and the "Other Minister", the Minister of Magic. Drawing most directly from the mention in The Prisoner of Azkaban that the Muggle Prime Minister had been alerted of Sirius Black's escape from the wizard prison, she introduced the sixth book with a fun and funny, but also informative, scene wherein Fudge visits the Prime Minister to explain what has been going on and to introduce, at the end of it, Rufus Scrimgeour, Fudge's replacement as Minister of Magic.


The scene is expressed as a combination of flashback (a clever way for Rowling to recap some of the most significant events of the earlier novels) and conversation, in which a bewildered Muggle Minister tries to figure out his bizarre new guests. It is significant to note that this chapter is told entirely from the point of view of the Muggle -- this gives Rowling the chance to show us clearly how the non-magical world understands (or fails to understand or even acknowledge) the magical world.


Earlier, we encountered Voldemort, Wormtail and Nagini from the point of view of Muggle Frank Bryce in The Goblet of Fire; this scene at the start of THBP is, to my recollection at least, only the second time in which Rowling writes for an extended period from the Muggle point of view.

In 17 short, lively pages, Rowling manages to provide her reader with a great deal of information about all that has taken place since the end of The Order of the Phoenix, including the escape and subsequent recapture of the Death Eaters, the re-emergence of Voldemort, the murder of Amelia Bones and Emmeline Vance, the possible presence of one or more giants in England, the revolt of the Dementors and the attempts by Voldemort to take over the Ministry.

She also makes it clear that the relationship between Dumbledore and Scrimgeour is not particularly comfortable.

It's an awesomely creative scene. It explains both what has happened since the last book ended and how the relationship works between the two governments: muggle and magical. It introduces us to Scrimgeour and tells us that the levels of violence and murder in the books are to rise once again.

And it delivers all of that in a very fast-paced, interesting fashion.

It's a great piece of writing.

And it's followed very quickly by a second great piece of writing: chapter two of THBP, "Spinner's End". More on that in my next entry.

The wonders of chocolate

We need to take a moment here to thank Joanne Rowling for one more thing and I think it is a really important thing:


She has given us one more reason to love chocolate.


According to Rowling, chocolate is an absolute must for a person who has suffered an encounter with a Dementor. In fact, chocolate is not just considered a nice thing to eat to make you feel better after you've been colded by a Dementor; it is the appropriate medical response to such an encounter. Even Madame Pomfrey confirms this fact.


I won't go so far as to suggest that Rowling, who has described the Dementors as her attempt to create a physical embodiment of Depression, thinks of chocolate as a form of anti-Depressant but she certainly does endorse it as a contributor to ongoing happiness and warmth in our lives.


So, the next time someone accuses you of enjoying too much chocolate, remind them of its benefits for health and happiness... and for recovery from Dementor encounters!

Harry Potter Studio Tour - An indescribable experience

Me with our friend Pollie, outside the Studio

As a wonderful surprise, my partner took me to England for a ten-day visit in honour of my 50th birthday. As an even more wonderful surprise, she booked tickets for the Warner Brothers Harry Potter Studio Tour in Watford Junction, north of London, on the actual day of my birthday.

To say that this tour was "magical" would be a terrible pun but very true. To say that it was "amazing" would be the understatement of the year. The Warner Brothers Harry Potter Studio Tour was quite probably the best major attraction I have ever visited. It offers an incredible amount to see and do and it is designed and presented in a remarkably visitor-friendly way.

Dementors lurk

If you don't believe me, as my partner Patti and our friend Pollie, who joined us for the tour, neither of whom are Harry Potter fans of any description. They loved the entire experience, even though I turned what is supposed to be a three-hour tour into a six-hour exploration of as many of the displays and presentations as I could take in before I became completely overwhelmed.

And that's one of the beauties of this tour: the first half hour is scripted, with staff leading you through a brief video and your entrance into the Hogwarts Great Hall, but after that you are left to your own devices, to wander the exhibits at your own speed, to spend as much time as you like examining the set for the Burrow, or Dumbledore's Office or Malfoy Manor, or watching the many explanatory videos or trying out the amazing interactive opportunities (spell casting lesson anyone?). You are not "guided" through at a particular speed so you can take your time. And, if you opt to rent a digital tour guide, you can listen to the interviews with directors and crew members, watch the videos, take it all in at your own pace.

My favourite set, the Headmaster's Office

Remember, this is a tour of the studios in which the Harry Potter films were made. You visit the actual sets that were used in the movies; you see the actual costumes and the actual models that were transformed, through the magic of film-making, into the many creatures that come to life on screen. There is so much detail there that a massive Harry Potter fan like me can become completely overwhelmed with just a single display (my favourite was Dumbledore's Office, I think).

You don't have to be a fan to enjoy it, though. Patti and Pollie loved the entire thing, learning as much about film making as about Harry Potter himself.

Because it was my birthday, I received a special badge and, as a result, was wished a "Happy Birthday" by the friendly staff throughout the tour. This also mean that I was befriended by a wonderful group of girls who were there for a birthday party. Two of them were sporting Hogwarts robes for the tour and one admitted to me later that she already owns 12 wands (!!!!). We kept encountering these young women all over the studio and their enthusiasm and excitement served to add to the thrill of my visit.

I don't plan to post all 400 photos (and 60-minutes of video) that I took on the tour in this one blog entry but I will finish with a final, very special shot. Our visit to the Studio Tour had been booked over a year ago so it was quite ironic (and slightly disappointing) when we found out, the day before we attended, that the Hogwarts Express display was about to open... four days after our visit.

Our sneak peek at the Hogwarts Express display!

Imagine how excited we were when we found out that the Studio had decided to hold a "soft opening" of the display on the very day of our visit, for just a half hour or so, to test it out with real visitors. So we got to see it, before just about any other member of the public had the chance. Awesome!!!

What did Snape know about the Map and Messrs M, W, P & P?

As I have said several times before, The Prisoner of Azkaban is probably my favourite of the Harry Potter books and films. So I approach reading this third novel with a great deal of anticipation and, most often, I sit down to the watch the film when I am coming to the end of the book.

I just love the way the film presents the time-turner elements of the story at the end.

My most recent reading, however, has raised some confusion in my mind, confusion with regard to what is actually going on in the scene in which Snape and Lupin square off over the discovery of the Marauders Map in Harry's possession.

What does Snape know about that map? And about "Messrs Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs", its creators?

Certainly, he appears to know a great deal: when he says to Lupin, "You don't think it more likely that he got it directly from the manufacturers", he seems to be indicating that he knows that Lupin and his friends created the map and that Lupin had, in fact, given it to Harry.

So why, then, does Snape allow Lupin to lie to him so blatantly in claiming that the map "looks like a Zonko product to me"?

And why doesn't Snape keep the map and take it to Dumbledore as evidence to support his theory that Lupin is helping his old friend Sirius Black?

We know that Snape is fully aware that Lupin is a werewolf (suggesting the nickname "Moony"); why would Snape not then be able to start to unravel what the other nicknames imply and then figure out how Sirius was able to get past the Dementors and enter the school?

I'm not trying to be critical; I am simply confused. Am I reading this wrong? Is Snape not fully aware of who the manufacturers of the Marauders Map were? Help me figure this out.

A couple of other points on The Prisoner of Azkaban:

On at least two occasions in this book (when Neville breaks a tea cup in Divination and when Hagrid drops a milk jug in his hut), we see magical characters scurry to clean up the mess. Why didn't they deal with the mess with magic?

In the film, when Lupin has his Defence Against the Dark Arts class first face the Boggart, we actually see the Boggart transform into a Dementor on Harry's turn. Lupin doesn't intervene until we, and everyone else, actually see the Dementor. Why, then, does Lupin later suggest that he intervened because he thought it would turn into Lord Voldemort?

In the book, Lupin intervenes before the Boggart transforms, which makes his explanation plausible. But, in the film the Dementor actually appears before Lupin steps in...

Two things to think about, I guess. And please help me to understand what Snape knew and did not know about the Marauders Map and the various nicknames for Lupin and his friends.

Introducing Bellatrix Lestrange

I just love the way J.K. introduces us to Bellatrix Lestrange, a Death Eater who would go on to become one of the key (and most memorable) new characters of the final three novels.

Rowling draws our attention to Ms. Lestrange slowly, gently, almost soothingly. She gives us significant information about the character but, in each instance, only in passing. Rowling introduces Bellatrix to us in such subtle ways that we almost miss the introduction.

And an important introduction it is.

First, we hear only the last name, and plural. The Lestranges. Mentioned in passing as being among the Death Eaters locked up in Azkaban. No first names, no descriptions. Just another name in a list.

Then comes Harry's visit to the Pensieve in Dumbldore's office, wherein he witnesses a series of hearings of the Wizard Court, trials of accused Death Eaters that took place in the months after Voldemort's fall.

I believe it is the third such trial. The Dementors escort four people into the court room to be tried and all our attention is focused, by virtue of our interest in Barty Crouch and his family, on the last of them: the boy.

Here is how Rowling describes the four:

"There was a thickset man who stared blankly up at Crouch, a thinner more nervous-looking man, whose eyes darted around the crowd, a woman, with thick, shining dark hair, and heavily hooded eyes, who was sitting in the chained chair as though it were a throne, and a boy in his late teens..."

It's a wonderfully simple, yet vivid description of the woman we will later come to know well: Bellatrix Lestrange, with her thick, shining dark hair, her heavily hooded eyes and her pride and certainty in her absolute devotion to the Dark Lord and his purposes.

The focus remains, however, on young Barty Crouch, interrupted only briefly by Bellatrix's defiant declaration of her devotion to Voldemort when the Dementors come to escort them all to Azkaban.

In that scene, we learn that the four are accused of torturing Neville's parents into incoherence using the Cruciatus curse. That means that Rudolphus Lestrange, Bellatrix's husband, must be one of the other two people in the group -- either the thickset man with the blank look or the thinner, more nervous man -- and yet we learn very little further about him throughout the final three novels. Bellatrix outshines him in this scene just as she will do the rest of the way.

And then, finally, we hear about the Lestranges from the Dark Lord himself. In the graveyard, as he surveys the Death Eaters who have returned to him, he encounters a gap in the circle.

"The Lestranges should stand here," he says, "But they are entombed in Azkaban. They were faithful. They went to Azkaban rather than renounce me... when Azkaban is broken open, the Lestranges will be honoured beyond their dreams."

But Voldemort has more on his mind at that point. His comments on the Lestranges are lost amid his interactions with all the other Death Eaters and, more especially, his ensuing duel with Harry Potter.

Such a quiet introduction. Such a slow build up. So masterfully written so that, every time Bellatrix makes an appearance, she is overshadowed by other characters or other events. Our attention as readers is drawn elsewhere so that we don't recognise just how important, how evil this character will become.

Why I think The Prisoner is the best book of the bunch

I haven't posted anything in a while (probably my longest break this year, though I may be wrong on that) due to the simple fact that I am struggling with what I want to say about Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

I just finished re-reading this the third novel in J.K. Rowling's series last week and thought immediately, "I have to blog about this book". But when I sat down at the keyboard, time and again, words failed me. Why? Because I was struggling to convey just how much I like this book.

For me, The Prisoner of Azkaban is the best of the seven novels. I've read them all enough times to be able to say this with some conviction. Expressing the "why" is by far the tougher challenge.

And, instead of attempting to write paragraph after paragraph extolling the virtues of this novel, its plot and characters, the writing style, etc., I think it might be simpler if I reduced it all down to a list.

So here are the ten reasons I think The Prisoner of Azkaban is the best of Rowling's seven excellent novels:

1. It is the last of the shorter books, which means you can read the whole thing in a brief period of time, in one sitting almost, and get the absolute most intense reading experience from it;

2. It is the first of the more "adult" books in the series; whereas The Philosopher's Stone and The Chamber of Secrets are clearly childrens' books, with simple plots and a great deal of time spent (deliciously) wondering at the magical world into which Harry is suddenly thrust, The Prisoner of Azkaban sets a terrifically complex, subtle and often terrifying adult story in a magical world we already know, with which we are already comfortable;

3. It tells an exceptionally exciting tale of its own but also starts to set the stage for later novels. From first page to last, a shadow (of the Grim, really) looms over Harry and, with her characteristic flair for misdirection, Rowling makes us feel the tension build as Sirius Black slinks closer and closer to our hero. On the flip side, however, Rowling lays down important building blocks for the return of Voldemort, with Trelawney's eerie prediction and Peter Pettigrew's final escape.

4. The novel introduces two extremely important characters who will play significant roles in Harry's life from now to the end of the series: Remus Lupin and Sirius Black;

5. The book stakes philosophical ground in the discussion of good and evil, of perception and truth, that will have reverberations throughout the rest of the novels;

6. The Prisoner of Azkaban gives Hermione her first real chance to shine, to prove herself a worthy heroine to stand beside Harry and Ron, while still not losing that part of her that made her interesting in the first place: her commitment to education, intellect and rationality, even in the face of the scorn of her friends;

7. The book gives us our first real glimpse of the lives of Harry's parents, both through the characters who knew them (Black, Lupin, Snape, Rosemerta, McGonagall, Hagrid, et al) and through Harry's horrific recollection of his parents' last moments alive, a recollection that Rowling carefully builds in each successive encounter with the Dementors;

8. The novel gives us our first real indication that Harry could be a truly great wizard. His perfection of the Patronus Charm, a piece of truly advanced magic, shows us that he does, in fact, have it within him to take on the challenges we are starting to realise lie in wait for him;

9. The book deals with the issue of time in an interesting way, creating a truly memorable set of climactic scenes; and

10. The Prisoner of Azkaban gives us our first warning that Rowling doesn't intend to make Harry's life, nor ours as readers of the series, easy. There are some gruesome scenes in this book and some very violent passages: I find Harry's recollections of his parents' murders incredibly effective, serving notice that we're not reading simple childrens' books any more.

I know. I will probably now read The Goblet of Fire, The Order of the Phoenix and the other books again and declare that each one, in turn, is the best. But right now I have to say that The Prisoner of Azkaban is the standard bearer in the Harry Potter series.

Do you agree? What's your favourite Harry Potter novel and why? Use the Comments function to tell me your thoughts.

What's Mrs. Figg doing in a raincoat?

I think there's a continuity error at the start of the film version of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

Think about the opening sequences of that movie. It's a brutally hot, sunny day and Harry encounters Dudley and his gang in a local playground. A terrible storm suddenly develops, bringing howling winds, pouring rain and finally Dementors, which attack Harry and his cousin in the underpass leading from the playground back to their neighbourhood. It's a sudden, freak storm that no one could anticipate. So sudden and so freaky that Dudley automatically thinks Harry has created it.

Harry fights off the Dementors and, in a key plot point, old Mrs. Figg appears at the end of the tunnel in a rain coat, umbrella in hand, to help Harry home.

Are you with me?

We've got a sudden, freak storm on a broiling hot, sunny day. Yet somehow Mrs. Figg is dressed for rain when she arrives. Strange, isn't it? And I don't think you could argue she saw the storm brewing, put on her raincoat, then walked all the way to the underpass in the time available. She's too old and slow and the storm and attack both happened too quickly.

I think the filmmakers blew it.

Please note, in the book, Mrs. Figg arrives panting and in her slippers. One of her cats warned her that Harry was out and that Mundungus Fletcher had abandoned his guard duty. She immediately set off to find him and was as caught off guard by the storm and Dementor attack as Harry was.