Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Literary Elements (Warning Spoilers)

Welcome to the end of the series! J.K. Rowlings and mine. I noted a few weeks ago that most of the people who were arriving at my site were arriving via searches for Harry Potter and Literary Elements. I have really enjoyed going back through the books looking for Literary Elements especially foreshadowing.

This was the book it all ended in. I have been rereading first books also. For example Anne McCaffrey's Dragonflight which was definitely a first book. There were elements that appeared in the first book which dropped out or were redefined in later books. The amazing thing to me is that J.K. Rowling not only didn't do that, but revisited elements that had apparently been minor details. For example the fact that Aberforth was present in an almost impercebtible way in Book 5 but showed up again importantly at the end of Book 7. The reference in book 3 about Pettigrew being in debt to Harry came back with force when Pettigrew tried to betray Voldemort and help Harry and Pettigrew's magical hand revolted and murdered him.

Emotional Design by Donald A. Norman

Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things by Donald A. Norman

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This book was an amazing discussion of the psychology behind the stuff we love. I particularly enjoyed how much it spoke to our social networking tools. Our desire to connect with tech is discussed. The chapter on the future of robots also spoke quite a bit to educational design. the author, was a Cognitive and Computer Scientist who studied how well things work. During this his time studying this he noted the frustration and devotion people developed with certain products.



My most valuable lesson from this book was the importance necessity of considering the affective and emotional side to design. This is especially vital in designing learning experiences. Learning is very much an emotional endeavor. We learn stuff that tugs at our emotion. We learn because we value the skill or information. All in all a terrific book that if you are a designer, educator or technologist you really ought to read.



The book is very accessible despite the academic credentials of Donald A. NormanDonald A. Norman


View all my reviews.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (warning spoilers)

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is my second favorite book in the series. I realized that just as I wrote it. I have always liked Snape and the mystery of him in this book was heightened. He had made an unbreakable vow with Narcissa Malfoy and it was also revealed that Severus was having doubts about commitments to Dumbledore. Again and again though Dumbledore expresses his faith in Snape.

By the way, Narcissa is another example of J.K. Rowlings' exceptional wordplay. Narcissa is clearly a reference to Narcissus and Narcissism the story from Roman/Greek mythology of the character who falls in love with his own reflection and drowns trying to get close to himself.
The other bit of wordplay that is significant in this book was the pensieve. It has shown up before, but it played a big role in this book. Depending on where you put the emphasis you could either pronounce the word (pensiv) or (penseev) but either way it is a variation on the word pensive meaning to ponder, muse or dream. The Pensieve also connotes a sieve or a sifter which makes the device a place to ponder and sift out meaning from your memories. Beautiful wordplay again.

My favorite bit of foreshadowing though was the Chapter entitled Horcruxes. I wish I could be certain though was Dumbledore's references to the Horcruxes and the time he spent telling Harry how certain he was that Voldemort intended to make his final Horcrux after Harry. It was no great leap for me to see that somehow Voldemort had unintentionally created a Horcrux in Harry. It's really easy to post this so far after the fact, but I really did know. The discussion of Horcruxes was the crucial point. Horcrux is also another play on words. Crux comes from the Latin for cross. My best guess for hor is that it either a reference to hoar or hoary or possibly horror. Whichever you choose or all three, the crux of the matter (yes, I think she is using this connotation too) is that the center or soul of Voldemort is a frosty, hairy ancient, horror. This makes particular sense when you consider her new book Tales of Beedle the Bard. And the tale of the Hairy Heart. The message there and in the Half Blood Prince seems to be don't destroy what is most precious. Be sure you keep you soul, your heart in tact....because it is your ability to love that makes you human. Which is what we all are Muggle and Magician alike.

An amazing story!

This is no real surprise to those of us who have already been using this resource, but you can get books, movies, internet access, study spaces, conference spaces and sometimes even classes and kids programs all free from this source. Glad to see it is finally getting some attention on National Media.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Interesting Easter Eggs

I was checking my feedjit traffic and decided to follow some of the searches on google.com on of them got me the following result.

http://www.gryffindorgazette.com/2007/03/14/easter-eggs-in-the-harry-potter-books/

It is a list of some interesting Easter Eggs in the Harry Potter books. One of them I disagree with because it says Hermione's Patronus is a weasel but it was actually an otter.

Banned!

I normally don't blog about the news or stuff I found on the internet (assuming that others can surf as well as me) but I liked this opinion and wanted to share:

Here's the link:

http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/Features/Columns/Default.aspx?article=BannedBook&gt1=27004

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Literary elements and foreshadowing (warning spoilers)

I have really enjoyed this chance to go back through the books. I have been reading them this time knowing the end and looking for the clues J.K. Rowling left for us. The fun and quite obvious one in this book was the whole chapter "In the Hog's Head" When Harry, Hermione and Ron enter the tiny pub Harry is tickled by the faint odor of .....goats. In one of the other books and (I can't remember which and don't want to be troubled with looking it up since no one reads this blog anyway) Albus Dumbledore refers to the fact we shouldn't worry what people write about us in the paper. His brother is a good example he was ridiculed in the paper for practicing unnatural charms on a goat. Harry also notices the long full hair, and eyebrows and a face that looks oddly familiar. Noteably absent is any reference to his eye color which would have possibly made the clues too obvious when Harry starts seeing snippets of blue in book 7. Well we find out in book 7 that it is Albus' brother Aberforth that is the bartender at the Hog's Head. This also casts a different light on why Albus would have visited the Hog's Head occasionally and a possible explanation as to how Albus was able to know so many of the details of the D.A. without having attended the meeting. I know that Mundungus was their too, but although Albus and Aberforth weren't close they were definitely allies. Again I am amazed at how well J.K. Rowiling set up future events and how well she planned things through the whole series. It could be serendipitous or an offhand comment she made about Dumbledore's goat loving brother growing into the goaty smelling bar, but for it all to fits so nicely certainly looks like really good planning on the part of the author.