Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (warning spoilers)

I missed last week due the the Holidays, but I want to continue my series about literary elements in Harry Potter. I have been focused on the element of foreshadowing and there sure was a lot of it in Harry Potter 4. There were two subplots that J.K. Rowling kept dropping hints about. The first element was Mad-Eye Moody's impostor replacement by Barty Crouch Jr. From the beginning there were subtle hints that Moody had been replaced. When Barty was finally revealed and detailed what he had done the hints and clues became evident.

The second subplot with foreshadowing and clues was the Rita Skeeter (Skeeter, sound uniquely insect like, no?) All along there were these fairly subtle references to beetles, and so when Hermione smugly revealed that she had Rita in the bag (or jar) and told us how she had put together the clues, I personally thought that I had solved it right along with her.

Another of my favorite examples of foreshadowing and dropping clues was during the scene when Bary Crouch Jr. has Harry in the Defense Against the Dark Arts office and Snape appears in his foe glass. J.K. Rowling is just too good to have done that incidentally. The foe glass, whether it was Moody's or Barty's is definitely showing Barty's foes as he had explained to Harry earlier. Well, Snape shows up in the foe glass. There is some argument on Goodreads as to whether Snape is actually good or not and whether people actually thought he was good. Personally, I wish that I had noted this a little earlier. Reading through it again, I am convinced that this is meant as a clue that Snape is a foe to Voldemort's biggest supporter. Constantly through the books J.K. Rowling has left us clues that Snape was in fact to be trusted. Dumbledore is virtually never wrong and never on anything big. Dumbledore's continued support of Snape is the biggest clue that Snape is, if not good, at least loyal. But this little clue is another piece of evidence that Snape is good.

Finally, during the confrontation with Voldemort and then Dumbledore's analysis of what happened, we see that rather than making himself more invulnerable, Voldemort has made himself more vulnerable, only later do we realize that he is more vulnerable to Harry specifically. By using Harry's blood to rebuild his body he has in fact overcome the protection provided by Lily when she died, but also strenghtened the connection between Harry and himself making it possible for Harry to read his mind regularly through the rest of the books.

Literary Elements in Harry Potter 4

I have already done my main posting for this week about Harry Potter 4, but I wanted to talk a little more about the elements of prophecy and prediction in the books. Some folks don't really like Professor Trelawney, but she is key to the whole series. It was her prophecy and Snape's reporting of it that sparked the Dark Lord's attack on James and Lily. She is a right old fraud for the most part, but she does play an important part in the books. Many times it is her class and the work that is done in it that plays counter-point to her own true prophecies and to Harry's insights into Voldemort. In fact in book 4 Harry has a most significant dream during class. Another example of how well J.K. Rowling adds elements to her stories.

Merry Christmas

I hope everyone had Merry Christmas, and I say that in the most general terms since no one is actually reading this blog. I thought some people were when I first installed the feedjit gadget, but when I installed google analytics and realized that on average people are only staying on this site 20 seconds I realized that anyone who comes here has landed by accident, oh well, maybe by sheer volume of writing I can actually trick people into thinking I have something to say.

Well, I got a copy of Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling for Christmas. It was a pretty good book but disappointing on some counts. My goodreads review is below

The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
Hermione Granger inherited a copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard from Albus Dumbledore in the original runes. This is an English edition with annotations by Dumbledore himself. The stories are fables or moral tales for the wizarding community. Much like the fables and tales in the Muggle world they have both fans and opponents. Dumbledore goes to great lengths to explain to all of us exactly what was intended as the moral of the tale which came across to me as unnecessary. Dumbledore apparently assumes that we aren't bright enough to figure out how to apply the moral of the fable without his help. Dumbledore also manages to portray himself as quite the genius, nearly infallible and rather more than a little arrogant.



I truly love J.K.Rowling's work and honestly have been a huge fan of Harry Potter since I laughed my way through the first chapter of The Sorcerer's Stone. I do hope any attempts on her part to return to the Wizarding world are better than this. It reminded me an awful lot of her other two mini-books: Quidditch through the ages and Fantastic Beasts and where to find them which were very gimmicky. I hate to see her considerable talent wasted on this. I had gotten my hopes up and wasn't left completely disenchanted, but mostly a little confunded. The stories were good, but a tad short even for the target audience. My 9 year old sone finished the stories in one quick evening, but skipped Dumbledore's explanations because they were too long. I did like it so I don't want to sound too negative, but it wasn't the visit back to the Harry's world that I had hoped for.


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More Harry Potter Foreshadowing

Well, dang it I missed the biggest and most obvious foreshadowing from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. I finished the book (again) and noticed the very obvious foreshadowing of Dumbeldore informing Harry that now Peter Pettigrew is indebted to him and there may come a time in the future when it would be important to Harry.

Well, turns out of course that Dumbledore was right! No big surprise there since J.K. Rowling was doing such a phenomenal storytelling job. She set up the clue because she had the end in mind.

When I have talked to people about storytelling, I often point out the importance of this. A good storyteller knows what subtle points to emphasize because they know which points will show up later in the story. I doubt that Rowling wrote this in and then when she got to Book 7 suddenly thought: Oh, I forgot about Pettigrew. She knew when she planned Book 3 that he needed to escape and he needed to be in debt to Harry.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (warning spoilers)

Continuing my series about the foreshadowing in Harry Potter I am realizing that it makes complete sense that several of the titles have won various awards for Young Adult Mysteries. Normally, I wouldn't have classified these books as mysteries, but each one of them actually is. This is why foreshadowing is so well done in the books. J.K. Rowling leaves us clues to understand the truth and we can figure it out if we try hard enough.

Scabbers illness was one of the examples. Hermione eventually figured out that Scabbers illness was tied to the escape of Sirius Black. Turns out Scabbers was ill because he was stressed out that he old friend was going to come and kill him. Not without good cause since that was exactly what Sirius had in mind. Throughout the book there are clues that not all is right with Scabbers. When he is examined at the Magical Menagarie Rowling points out that Scabbers is missing a toe. This was foreshadowing the revelation that all that was found of Peter Pettigrew was his finger. Finally, when Scabbers is revealed to be Pettigrew in Animagus form it is fully revealed that Pettigrew cut off his own finger to fake his death.

Hermione is the voice of reason and faith again. Her unwavering faith in Crookshanks turns out to be well placed. Crookshanks was the trustworthy one all along and it was Scabbers that was untrustworthy. As demonstrated by the Sneak-a-scope going off when Crookshanks attacks Scabbers. Hermione incedentally is one who's faith in Snape was well placed. She trusts him right up until he kills Dumbledore in Book 6. She believes all along that Dumbledore must have reasons for trusting Snape.

Rowling also gave us some good foreshadowing with the names on the Marauder's Map. When Harry asked Lupin if he knew these folks he demures but admits that he does know them. As the authors of the Marauder's Map are revealed to be none other than James, Sirius, Remus and Peter the names Prongs, Padfoot, Moony and Wormtail make sense and had been a clue as to what was going on all along.

I recently posted in a discussion on GoodReads.com that J.K. Rowling doesn't really trick us. The bad guys are bad guys. I may have to retract that statement. In this book there were clues all along that Sirius wasn't out to get Harry. For example, He apparently went after Ron, but didn't kill him even though he hadn't been reluctant to kill innocent Muggles years before. Well this as all a clue that he wasn't in fact after Ron or Harry nor had he killed any innocent Muggles. He was after Pettigrew. Even with these clues, I don't think I expected Sirius to be good and I certainly didn't suspect Ron's rat. But it is clear that Rowling planned from the beginning the storyline with Pettigrew. She was certain to have him present in all the books and that we knew that he had been in the family for a long time. Rowling shows her craft and foresight in this book.

Rowling also has some great word play in this book. The names on the Marauder's Map was a fun play on words. The code names for each Animagus form are clever and engaging. Crookshanks, with his bowed legs ( Crooked shanks) also imply he may be some kind of a crook and possibly untrustworthy, distracting us from the true sneak, Scabbers. Dementors who suck out life's happiness imply that to be unhappy and focus on the negatives of life is truly demented. Remus Lupin was like Sirius Black an interesting word play. I mentioned in an earlier post that Sirius is the dog star and well he's a black dog. Remus was the name of the brother to Romulus for whom Rome was named. Both brothers were, according to legend, suckled by a wolf which gave them great strength and wisdom to lead the people. Lupin is a form of lupine which means wolf-like. His whole names indicates that he is a were-wolf.

Rowling sures gives us lots to think about which makes these books fun to come back to even when they mystery is over and we know what the result will be it's still draws us in as the The Grim drags Ron under the Whomping Willow and out to the shrieking shack.

Well, see you in Hogsmeade.

Harry Potter Foreshadowing: Book 2 (Warning spoilers)

Book 2 starts off with Harry lonesome at home. Harry is instructed to stay upstairs make no sound and pretend that he isn't there. A task made much more difficult by the arrival of Dobby. Dobby gives us the first bit of foreshadowing by telling Harry that the danger he faces this year doesn't have anything to do with Voldemort. Later we find that in fact the it didn't have anything to do with Voldemort but rather with Tom Marvolo Riddle.

The more significant foreshadowing happens all through the book as we find again and again that Harry has lots in common with the Heir of Slytherin and with Slytherin himself. He speaks Parseltongue being one of the most notable. Another part of the foreshadowing occurs when Harry takes possesion of Tom's Diary. When he does the attacks stop. When he loses it the attacks start back up. This was the clue that the diary was influencing the monster. Dobby earlier had given another clue related to the diary. One of the premier examples of how well Rowling had planned these books. When Dobby warned Harry he mentioned that Voldemort had powers that no decent wizard would use. Was this a reference to Voldemort turning the diary into a Horcrux? It sures seems to be. And if Dobby knew what it was it was an impressive feat for the little elf because Dumbldore suspects that not even Malfoy knew what it was (check book 6)

Speaking of Dumbledore the most impressive foreshadowing was right here in the end of book 2. Dumbledore spends a significant amount of time talking to Harry about the similarities between Harry and Tom. The most amazing reference being Dumbledore's revelation that he suspects that Voldemort transferred some of his power to Harry explaining how Harry has the ability to speak to snakes. Significantly it is Harry's decisions that mark him as different, but nonetheless this is the first clue that Harry is in fact a horcrux and has a portion of Voldemort's spirit sharing his body.

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Percy Jackson and the Olympians

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Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Finding some more fun foreshadowing or is it? I was looking through Harry Potter 1 last light and reading about Harry's arrival at Gringott's bank. Hagrid goes to great length's to tell him how crazy anyone would have to be to try and break in to Gringott's even Griphook brags about how "anyone but a Gringott's Goblin would get sucked in"

What were they thinking?

I would give a dollar to know what this person was thinking when they did their search. I would give another dollar to find out if they found what they were looking for.

Hogwart's Year One: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

This book was also published under the title Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone for the U.K. audience. Apparently the U.S. audience was simply not sophisticated enough to wrap their heads around the idea of a Philosopher's Stone.

The elements of foreshadowing in this were the frequent and obvious references to Harry's scar. From the moment we meet Harry his scar is his distinguishing mark. This scar was the first indication that there was a connection between Harry and Voldemort the evil sorcerer who must not be named. When Hagrid describes to him that he has been marked there is foreshadowing. Hagrid tells him: That was no ordinary cut. It wasn't even ordinary for a curse. Harry was the first and only to survive Voldemort's killing curse. The scar on Harry's forehead becomes the first foreshadowing of what is to come.

Robot Visions

This is my review on goodreads.com of this book.

Robot Visions by Isaac Asimov

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is yet another in the vast sea of work by Isaac Asimov. What really made this a winner for me was the set of essays in the book about why robots will succeed and thrive. One particular essay regards the reason we will create human shaped robots. Short answer: Because they can interact with our world.


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