Things Everybody Knows

Mom is behind on the Harry Potter reading, so I was reading some of it out loud to her, and we had stopped to discuss names at one point.

Mom: ...and of course, "Dumbledore" is Anglo-Saxon for "Bumblebee."
Me: [blank look] really...?
Mom: Oh, sorry, I thought everyone knew that.

She evidently reads different books than the rest of us. :-)

Deathly Hallows

***** WARNING! SPOILERS AHEAD! *****
***** (Only the first paragraph is safe.) *****

I picked up my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at Books Inc. last night and started reading around 1:00 AM. Took a three hour nap in the wee hours of the morning, then dove right back in and finished around 8 this evening. I read it on my own, since Antonia and Ryan decided they wanted to go through it at a slower pace. I missed the reading-aloud, and the play-by-play discussions, but it was good to go at my own rate, especially considering I was stopping to cry after most of the last 7 or 8 chapters.

This book was intense all the way through. When Hedwig and Mad-Eye Moody died so early on, I knew it was going to be a rough ride, but in a way, the enormity of it really started sinking in for me when we learned what Hermione had to do to her family. The chapter where Hermione was tortured and Dobby was killed just tore me up, and by the time Fred, Lupin, and Tonks died, I was ready to be a basket case for the rest of the book. I was completely at J. K. Rowling's mercy when Harry was marching off to face death without even stopping to say goodbye to Ginny.

But on to the good things, too. I was so happy about the resolution of the Snape question, though the themes of uncertain trust and constant, unrequited love currently give me a real emotional yank. The fact that even Kreacher was redeemed, which I didn't remotely expect, was like a beautiful little gift. I even felt considerably more sympathetic to the Malfoys by the end. And Percy coming back. That was good. I thought it was wonderful that Luna could recognize Harry even through the Polyjuice potion, and that Neville got the heroic deed he deserved. Ron had me worried when he bailed on Harry and Hermione, but he pulled through and I'm very proud of him. The looks into Dumbledore's past were surprising, but I still love him. I didn't expect the "Nineteen Years Later" epilogue (because I didn't even let myself peek at the table of contents before I read) but I was very grateful for it. As much as she could have left us without an explicit happily-ever-after ending, I really needed it.

Anyway, that probably wasn't all too coherent, but it's about all I'm up for right now, given that I'm still pretty emotional about it all and don't yet have anyone who's finished it that I can talk it out with. Now I guess it's time to start coming to terms with a world devoid of future Harry Potter books and mysteries.

Not Impressed

Just got back from seeing The Order of the Phoenix. Appropriately enough, my least favorite book became my least favorite movie (so far), though for different reasons. It was really just very poorly done all around. Everything felt extremely under-acted, as if most of the actors weren't even trying to get into their emotions (look at how upset Uncle Vernon barely is about the attack on Dudley, for instance). People looked bad in completely fixable ways (e.g. costume or makeup details, or lighting and camera angles). None of the magic special effects were at all impressive, and the Dumbledore-Voldemort duel was pitiful. (Can't we have just a little bit of choreography in there, please?) The story editing is admittedly a very tough job, but it still just felt gaping and ragged, with everybody rushing just to cover the cliff's-notes version of it. I really hope some more effort gets put into movie #6. I'm okay having 5 as a throwaway one if we have to, but I want 6 to be good.

I'll stop complaining now. On the plus side, I'll say that Luna Lovegood did a great job, and I also loved the thestrels.

And yes, trip-blogging should happen soon, I just haven't yet had the energy for it.

The Missing Magic

So having finished Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince for the third time, I feel inclined to write a bit more about what I think magic is and isn't (see also my previous post on the subject for more). One of these days I'm still going to write a big, all-encompassing theory of magic, but for now it's just coming out in bits and pieces. [Spoiler warning here, but you've all had a month to read the book, so no complaining if you haven't yet.]

I feel very much as though there is something J. K. Rowling isn't telling us about magic, even within the context of her books. This usually bugs me when reading about the classes the kids take, but in HP6 one particular thing struck me regarding the Prince's Potions book.

There are spells written in the margins that the Prince apparently composed himself, as evidenced by the crossings-out and rewritings. That, of course, raises the question of how one actually goes about creating a new spell. Given that (almost?) all the spells in these books are only one or two words long, it seems unlikely that simply arranging the correct sequence of letters is all there is to it. If that were the case, it would be more like discovering new spells than creating them, which doesn't seem right. Are there a finite number of spells in the world? How did they originally get associated with their particular words? It just doesn't work.

Occasionally in Charms class, we hear of a particular wand movement that accompanies a given spell, which adds a bit more dimension to it, but the movement does not seem to be very important for spells in general, beyond simply aiming them. Wands are tools for focusing the will/concentration/etc. to create the magic, and I would be inclined to see words as the same way, especially considering all the talk of nonverbal spells in this latest book. Advanced wizards with sufficient concentration power don't need to actually speak their spells. So I'm a bit disappointed that even Dumbledore is rendered helpless when he loses his wand. I think he has more power in him than that.

Now something I did like from HP6 was the scene in the cave leading to the Horcrux. For example:

"Yes, this is the place," said Dumbledore.

"How can you tell?" Harry spoke in a whisper.

"It has known magic," said Dumbledore simply.

....

Twice Dumbledore walked right around the cave, touching as much of the rough rock as he could, occasionally pausing, running his fingers backward and forward over a particular spot, until finally he stopped, his hand pressed flat against the wall.

"Here," he said. "We go on through here. The entrance is concealed."

Harry did not ask how Dumbledore knew. He had never seen a wizard work things out like this, simply by looking and touching; but Harry had long since learned that bangs and smoke were more often the marks of ineptitude than expertise.

[pg. 557-558]

I think there's something really important being hinted at here. Dumbledore's magic is qualitatively different from Harry's, and from most of the magic we get to see in these books. Magic is something he is, not just something he does. He feels it and senses it and interacts with it directly.

And so I'm kind of worried about Harry. Most of what he's getting in school are magic words, and potion ingredients, and instructions to focus on the three D's while spinning in place. There's no discussion of what the magic actually is, or how one internalizes it in the same way (even if not to the same degree) as Dumbledore or, presumably, other accomplished wizards. I would think that after six years of school they would have gotten more advanced than they have. Harry's got to face Voldemort next year, and Chosen One or not, I'm not sure he's been given the magical skills to do it.

And, of course, aside from being concerned for Harry, I just want to know all this for myself.

Third Time's the Charm

So, yeah. I started Harry Potter 6 again. Eric C. loaned me the audio book version, though, so I get to "read" it that way now. There's still an important clue that I vaguely remembered and wanted to verify, though somehow I missed it entirely on my second (admittedly fast) reading. It's neat to hear Jim Dale reading it, too. He won an award of some sort for his reading of book 5, with something like 134 separate character voices in it. Neat. He does do a good job at that, though I'd say he could use a bit more pitch variation when it comes to the female characters and the kids. Ginny in particular seems to have a surprisingly deep voice for a 15 year old girl. Oh well. It's fun.

Halfway

Antonia and I just reached the halfway point in the new Harry Potter book. (We're reading it out loud to each other, otherwise it would probably be finished by now.) We managed to get our copy not too long after midnight last night, then stayed up until nearly 4 AM reading it. Then about 3.5 hours of sleep and starting again. Now a few hours of napping and then back to the book. (Well, a few hours of napping for me, but a short nap and some running for Antonia, so she doesn't go entirely without training this weekend.)

So as not to be too spoiler-y, I will restrict my comments to the following: (1) I'm liking Harry a lot more than I did in the last book, (2) chapter 14 was awesome, (3) Justin will be glad that more of the kids are getting clues finally, and (4) I never knew how much the phrase "gum disease" could make me laugh.

Accio Book 6!

I've got a reserved copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince waiting for me at Borders, to be picked up at midnight tonight. So after a bit of Friday Night Waltzing, Antonia and I are going to go get it and then read it (aloud) straight through the rest of the weekend. Or at least as much as we can, minus time for some minimal sleeping and eating. I am quite excited.

Harry and the Potters

I suppose it was bound to happen eventually. Harry and the Potters is a group formed by two brothers who dress up as Harry Potter and sing bad rock songs recounting the events of the various books. It's the sort of thing that's bad enough to be funny, though, so go to their website and check out some of their sample mp3s. (Warning: there will be spoilers here if you haven't read all the books. Yes, there are still some silly people out there who haven't read them all.)

You really do have to listen to them to get the full effect, but here are some of the lyrics that particularly made me laugh. First of all, for sheer simplicity, we have the chorus to "Stick it to Dolores":

Oh my god, you look like a frog [4x]
Umbridge, you're going down [4x]

Then the awkwardly-unmusical-lyrics award goes to "Wizard Chess", which is about Christmas activities and presents:

I got a mysterious gift from my dead dad
It was an invisibility cloak -- how rad
Oh, oh, oh-oh-oh
We'll spend our Christmas being invisible
Oh, oh, oh-oh-oh
We'll be invisible this Christmas

"The Human Hosepipe" was probably the one that made me laugh the most, though. Selected excerpts:

So we sat there with all the couples kissing
and soon things began deteriorating
and you began turning into the human hosepipe
...
[chorus:]
Cho Chang, what have I done?
I don't care where you and Cedric were snogging
Cho Chang, what have I done?
I just want to replay this Valentine's day.
...
Well, maybe I shouldn't have mentioned Hermione
And maybe you shouldn't have brought up Cedric Diggory
Because I'd rather not talk about your dead ex-boyfriends over coffee

My goodness, that was hilarious. Musical quality regardless, props to these guys for starting the band and making me laugh.

Harry Potter y la Orden del Fénix

I finally managed to finish Harry Potter book 5 in Spanish this weekend. It took me about a month to do all 893 pages of it. It was every bit as exciting the second time around, even in Spanish. I read it so fast when it came out a year ago that I'd lost a lot of the details by the time I started it again. So that was fun. I must say, though, that I found myself somewhat more disappointed with Harry in this book than I remember being in some of the others. I disliked things like how he handled (or didn't) the Occlumency lessons, or how he forgot about Snape being in the Order, or especially using the Crucio curse. That just wasn't cool, even if it was on Bellatrix LeStrange. Oh well. I think I probably just identify too much with Hermione, anyway.

I'm going to try to get something in Spanish for my next audiobook. Reading Harry Potter is all very good, but listening practice will probably be better for my upcoming Costa Rica trip. Of course, I should practice speaking Spanish, too. But I tend to have fewer chances to do that.

Harry Potter and the Moviegoers of Azkaban

I saw Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban with Mom today. I think it had been a while since I'd had a good Harry Potter fix, so this was a lot of fun. You could definitely tell the change to a new director -- everything was a lot darker and a bit creepier, but I think it was appropriate, since the books change their tone this way a bit as well, as you get to the third book and beyond. There were some wonderful new sets, and a new location for Hogwarts as well, which was absolutely beautiful (though a bit farther off from the description in the books, I think). A lot had to be chopped from the book to fit it into a 2-hour movie, but I think they did a very good job of it this time around. I would have added a few things back in, but on the whole I think it was well edited. Pay attention to the music in this movie, too. There was a greater variety than in the previous two, including what sounded like some authentic Medieval or Renaissance music, which was a nice touch that fit well with the castle setting.

The Marauder's Map was always one of my favorite magical artifacts from all of the books, and I loved the one they created for this movie. (Watch the footprints on it during the closing credits, too -- it's fun.) The Whomping Willow was really neat, as well. The dementors and the hippogriff and the grim were all quite good, but the one that was really awesome was the werewolf. I had always imagined werewolves as fairly humanoid, or at least bipedal, whereas Mom had always thought they just turned into regular wolves. Professor Lupin, though, was in between and very different from either one of these possibilities. I didn't think I liked it at first, but it turned out to be far cooler and far scarier than either alternative.

So now I'm completely in Harry-Potter-mode, with no new book due out for probably another year or two. Argh. Meanwhile, though, I'll compensate by reading Book 5 in Spanish, which I just requested at the library, so hopefully I'll be able to pick it up soon.

And while we're on the subject of cool kids' books, I wanted to mention that the Lemony Snicket books are being made into a movie coming out in December: check out the trailer for A Series of Unfortunate Events. That looks like it'll be a lot of fun. I'm going to see if I can read the last seven or so books in the series before that comes out.

I got to watch Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets in Spanish last night. That was pretty fun. I actually understood a fair amount, though it helped that I had seen it in English before, and read the book in both languages.

I noticed that the basilisk actually looks rather more like a legless lizard than a snake. Where's Lacey when I need to make pit-tag jokes?