One of my lingering issues was Harry’s future relationship(s) with the Durstleys. To be sure, he’d have nothing to do with Vernon, and probably little to do with Petunia. But his last moments with Dudley did leave the possibility that the two of them might not spend their lives completely estranged.
Yes, I did find the complete absence of the Dursleys from the resolution to be a bit strange, especially since there was so much emphasis on their having to go into hiding.
I can’t really add my thoughts on finishing the HP books, as I didn’t. I ground to a halt late in book 6.
While I thoroughly enjoyed the first few books, I started to realize that Harry really *doesn’t * deserve all the attention he gets. There’s absolutely nothing special about him. As a matter of fact, he’s kind of a loser.
This became clear to me in Goblet of Fire. He didn’t work on succeeding in the competition at all - he actively avoided working on the clues and had to be coached through the whole fiasco. While he did well under pressure, his attitude and conduct during most of the book is deplorable. And even after the horrible events in that book, he continues to evade responsibility and closes his eyes to the consequences.
When compared to his father, he comes off looking even worse. His father and his friends not only developed the Marauder’s Map on their own, they also taught themselves to become Animagi in order to help their friend. What did Harry do? Uh, let’s see. He cribbed most of his schoolwork off of other people’s efforts (Hermione, the HB Prince, etc.). He did stupid things that put the lives of his friends in danger, simply because he wouldn’t go to an authority figure for help. People die because of his ineptitude. And yet, he’s still considered the hero.
By the last hundred pages of book 6, I came to the conclusion that Harry Potter was a selfish little git who should have never been allowed in Hogwarts. The incident where he hid, yet again, the fact that he was in possession of a very strange schoolbook, I just tossed the book away and never returned to it. I mean, if anyone should know that books aren’t always what they appear to be, it should be Harry (recall the diary from CoS).
Neville should have been the hero. He was a better man in every way.
I found the sixth book to be the best.
Everything you say might be true, but I don’t believe the protagonist in a mature work of fiction need be the unequivocal good guy. All those things – undeserving of reverence, loserishness, cowardice, dishonesty, laziness, stupidity – are perfectly okay characteristics of a protagonist. Why not? I’m not looking for a hero. I’m looking for a good story.
I disagree. Through most of the books, all Molly has done is WORRY about her kids and loved ones. It became annoying. For her to confront Bellatrix shows her courage (and explains Ginny a bit more) and prowess as a witch.
I hated Fred dying. Hated it.
But more than that, I hated the whole “you have one hour” just like a 1960s evil James Bond villain. Come on–that old chestnut?
IMO, most of the books suffer from lack of sharp editing, but HP7 is the worst one for this. It’s a mess. Don’t get me wrong, I loves me some Harry Potter, but as writing? It needs a scalpel and the clear cold light of day on it. Too much contrivance, too much dawdling and then jam-packed action. And then the epilogue. Ugh.
I like Rowling’s “message” throughout. I like the world she created, with its myriad details and just the right amount of whimsy. I like her characters. But she cannot tightly plot and sometimes her dialogue clanks. There, I’ve said it.
Re the houses: it occurs to me that Luna’s house is represented subtly by her sweater in the film, as is Cho’s. It ain’t much, but it’s there.
I never saw Harry with Hermione–it did cross my mind when I read the first book (because JKR had announced there’d be 7 books total), but the sparks between Ron and Hermione were too obvious to ignore. I think Ginny could have been better developed in the early books (the possession of her seems forced, but then a possession would be, and the book is from Harry’s POV, so she is naturally distant, I suppose).
It made me very sad, but I think that indicates a successful execution of drama. Very effective.
I agree wholeheartedly with all this.
I agree that I never saw Harry and Hermoine getting together, and I will also agree that he and Ginny were WAY too forced. There was a good 2 books worth of Harry secretly liking Cho, and then the culmination of it in Order when they finally get together. Then once they have their little falling out, he latches on to Ginny in like 3 days. There wasn’t even an inkling of maybe he likes her and now that she’s hot/popular he gets jealous of her and her newest boyfriend (Dean?).
Re: Harry and Draco…Since Harry and co. saved his life twice throughout book seven, and it was told that Draco didn’t really enjoy being totally evil anyway (he liked being a bully, not a villain) I figured that neither of them liked one another, but there was a mutual respect. Draco respected Harry for saving his life, and not holding a huge grudge against him; and Harry respected Draco for not being the epitome of evil as he was tapped.
Wasn’t Rowling given pretty much free rein on (at least) the last two books? And iirc, she was kinda being hurried along on the last one. Yeah, they could have used another pass through, but I think they didn’t give her time to do it. Which is a shame, but typical.
She wasn’t given free reign on the first 5?
i thought that harry and draco were like harry and dudley. they even have matching “d” names. they finally come to an understanding but will never interact much. both “d’s” are bullies and really not people you would want in a foxhole with you. dudley seems to come around a bit more than draco.
i see harry and dudley perhaps sending christmas greetings and perhaps a family get together here and there when they have kidlets. but never going beyond a distant cousin thing.
harry and draco would be even further distant as there isn’t a close blood relationship. just a few nod, perhaps a greeting if they are in a public area together. not much more, really draco doesn’t come around at all.
draco’s mum did more for harry that draco ever did.
Oh, I agree. It was good, but I still hated it. I wish it had been Percy who died, while trying to fight the Deatheaters. That would have provided a better redemption for him and spared one of my favorite characters.
What Rowling did best was evoke a world. In a weird way, the books are just the start of it. Hogwarts in my mind is a real place and I can create all manner of characters and have things happen to well known characters to my own satisfaction. I don’t write slash fic, but when I think of HP, I think of a mishmash of Rowling’s books, the films, and my own “filler”. I have done the same with LOTR and Narnia and even Pern–any good fantasy will provide fodder for an active imagination.
She needed a second epilogue. Having seen his second son off on the Hogwarts Express, Harry turns to Ginny and says, “Darling, have you got any contact information on Dedalus and Hestia? I think it’s about time we let the Dursleys go home, don’t you?”
:smack:
Quidditch scoring does not work very well for individual games, but it works out a little better for multi-game tournaments. If, say, Slytherin and Hufflepuff win two games each, determining who wins the Cup can be done on points alone (because between those two, Dumbledore will not swan in and declare Gryffindor the victor. Unless he does).
We made it work pretty well in the online Harry Potter game I played on for a long time (yes, I know, ultra-geek, but coded Quidditch made for a fun little tactical game).
Overall I liked the books well enough: they weren’t great literature and there were some really annoying characters, especially the Big Three. Hermione is a very accurate teenaged girl who reminds me very uncomfortably of myself when I was younger. Lord, I was insufferable. Ron is frankly dim and thoughtless, even if he does mean well, and I never saw any chemistry with him and Hermione at least in part because I never liked him much. I liked the other Weasleys well enough. Harry’s about the worst of the bunch, the smug little git. He rivals Ron in thoughtlessness, and being ostracized by his fellow students was rather to be expected.
Snape, naturally, was the most fun. I still have a lot of affection for Lupin, but by the last books I wanted to shake him and tell him to get over himself. He did, in the end, for which one may be thankful.
This is a red herring. It doesn’t matter whether you believe that ambition is inherently evil. The results showed that Slytherin house turned out to be a good incubator for evil.
In any case, the four “qualities” that the houses represent are arbitrary anyway. There’s no reason why those four are essential to categorizing human beings. And human beings are more complex than being categorized in a four-type system can encompass anyway.
Upon realizing that Slytherin tends to produce bad apples, the logical thing to do is to replace Slytherin house with a house that personifies a different important human characteristic. Or start over and recategorize all four houses.
In the face of the evidence, it’s just plain silly to keep things as they are.
No reason at all. These are just four qualities that the founders valued in students. That doesn’t mean that every human being fits neatly into one of the four.
Having given this more thought, I think that considering Harry’s emotionally abusive childhood, it’s amazing how decent he turned out to be. By all rights, he should be a sociopath.
He probably wasn’t really old enough to develop crazy tendencies and aside from probably having an extraordinarily low self esteem, he probably wasn’t TOO bad yet. Then once he became a wizard he actually had something to live for, so he became more “normal” than nuts
Though ambition isn’t evil, it does provide a very good breeding ground for it. Think of it this way: the ambitious have large aspirations, they want to be the leader, the “alpha” or otherwise. As such, they’re EXTREMELY influenced by those around them, they see the people in their forced social structure around them and decide to do that only BETTER, because then they’ll win those people’s respect as well as do it well enough to lead. As such, if you introduce a significant amount of evil people into the ambitious person’s social structure they emulate the evil people’s behaviors so they can better themselves and fulfill their aspirations by becoming the leader of their peers. Combine this will EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM trying to do the same thing and you get a bitter pissing match only seen by the likes of 4chan with politics more convoluted and out of control than the 2008 presidential campaigns.
Nicely put.
I think with Draco and his Quest For Power, he came to realize that hanging out with Voldemort wasn’t a good thing and that Voldemort was a selfish, meglomananicaly killing asshole. Something that even his parents, staunch supporters of V’s realized much too late.
They didn’t get punished, as far as we know, but they have to co-exist.
The epilouge was horrible and felt very rushed. The setting was good, but with all the kids names and stuff it was like she pulled a chapter from someone’s fanfic page and used it, minus the little tiny hearts over the i.
And when you sort people into the four categories of brave, loyal, intelligent, and ambitious, you’re going to get a disproportionate number of assholes in the “ambitious” group.
There was sort of a major flaw in the Voldemort character. For anyone seeking to achieve hegemonic power, charm and charisma is a key. Tom Riddle did show this trait while at school, but the returned Voldemort did nothing to make himself beloved by his followers. In order for him to be successful, he should have returned to his charming ways.