Set
There's not a word yet, for old friends who've just met.
posted
The end of the Harry Potter series felt kind of weak, to me.
Reading series that aren't finished yet (Wheel of Time, Harry Potter, etc.) just gives me time to *think* about the story, and that's never good, because I tend to come up with 'ties-everything-together' endings, and the really, real authors inevitably abandon half of the subplots they introduce and go somewhere else, leaving me feeling cheated.
IIRC, the first, second and third Potter books had the Sorting Hat calling out the oppositional / competitive House structure at Hogwarts as *being part of the problem,* and several times various characters were 'outed' as having been obvious members of the wrong house. (Harry supposed to be a Slytherin, but begged to be in Griffindor, someone pointing out that it was odd that Hermione wasn't a Ravenclaw, and her copping that she *wanted* to be a Griffindor instead, Ron fearing that he would be the first member of his family to 'fail' to be a Griffindor and end up a Hufflepuff/Ex Miscellenea sort, etc.)
After this, IMO, ham-handed foreshadowing (the Sorting Hat mentioning it in almost every book, for instance), I really expected the 'victory' at the end of the series to depend on the four Houses pulling together, and Harry, Hermione and Ron *leaving Griffondor* and moving into the houses they were originally Sorted to join, and using their new positions in those houses to pull the four houses together and end the diviseness and feuding that made it so easy for Voldemort's faction to keep them ineffective 'easy pickings.'
Neville would have ended up being 'big man on campus' of Griffindor, with Harry, Hermione and Ron moved on to coordinate the other three houses, and none of them would have found their new houses to just roll over and let them take over, with Hermione having to prove herself all over again, Ron having to shout down the fairly independent members of his 'new house' and Harry, obviously, having the worst time of all, surrounded by Machievellian schemers and with Snape as his House advisor!
But no. The Sorting Hat was apparently full of crap, and all of House Slytherin was pretty much shoved in a corner and placed under 'house arrest' for the big finale, while Houses Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff remained bridesmaids, who stood around while the Griffindors (Harry, Hermione, Neville, Ron and various other Weasleys) got all the action and saved the day.
Stupid Hat! Got me all worked up for an ending that never happened!
Registered: Aug 2006
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posted
Having not read most of the previous books, I was completely thrown by the use of the Sorting Hat in the finale. Only after researching online did I figure out what had happened . . .
That said, I liked Book 7, particularly the use of Snape as the unexpected, unsung hero of the piece.
-------------------- The Semi-Great Gildersleeve - writing, super-heroes, and this 'n' that
From: The Stasis Zone | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Do members here believe that Slytherin was created to be the evil house? Would one have to have an inclination to cheating and questionable ethics to be sorted into Slytherin?
-------------------- Go with the good and you'll be like them; go with the evil and you'll be worse than them.- Portuguese Proverb
From: Illinois | Registered: Jun 2010
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posted
Nah. Under normal conditions I'd expect Slytherin to attract a certain type of kid from a family fixated on blood-status aristocracy, ambitious and with an entitled mindset but not inherently evil. No worse than the worst sort of Gryffindors, kind of impulsive and reckless.
Set - that's a pretty cool alternate path you laid out. I really expected a few minor Slytherins to cross over. At least a few former Slytherins ought to have done a cost/benefit analysis of life under Voldemort and opted out.
From: Douglasville, GA | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Damn you Set for being so brilliant. Now that's going to bug me if I ever reread the books.
From: Manhattan, NY | Registered: May 2011
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posted
Emily, I'd definitely call myself a fan, but I guess not so much to the point where I've joined Pottermore yet. How is it?
One thing put me off: I believe you have to take a test and be sorted into a house based on it? I don't care for what I assume the test would be like (the kind of thing that's been on the internet forever and that I've never done), and for it to be mandatory just made me pass on the whole thing.
Have I been wrong about that, or have they changed it?
From: Manhattan, NY | Registered: May 2011
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Set
There's not a word yet, for old friends who've just met.
posted
quote:Originally posted by Emily Sivana: Do members here believe that Slytherin was created to be the evil house? Would one have to have an inclination to cheating and questionable ethics to be sorted into Slytherin?
That seems the way it turned out, in the books, but the first book made it seem like the original defining characteristic of the House founder was his ambition, not his moral or ethical shortcomings.
From a 'sympathy for the devil' standpoint, House Slytherin would seem necessary. Hufflepuff is, at best, disorganized. Ravenclaw sounds like the sort of group that would remain mired in ivory tower intellectualism and pure theory. Griffindor is associated with courage and valor, which, while great and all, are purely reactionary traits. One isn't 'brave' in a vacuum. Something (generally something bad...) has to happen, before bravery becomes a factor in a situation.
Slytherin, on the other hand, seems to adopt a very *active* sort of philosophy (for good or ill, usually ill...). While Ravenclaw is thinking, and Griffindor is reacting, Slytherin is the one that's actually doing something. Sadly, they have degenerated to the point where 'doing something' isn't something constructive like helping found the world's premier wizarding school, and more destructive. But that's, for the most part, the result of the fires fanned by Voldemort. Ten generations after the Harry Potter cycle, when 'he who must not be named' is a footnote in the history books, House Slytherin might have shed any ties to anti-muggle elitism and death-eaters and all that nasty business.
That's another factor that kinda bugs me about everyone remaining all 'Griffindor rules, everyone else drools!' We really didn't get to see much of anything from Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff. Indeed, the notion that Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff could ever have won *anything* scholastically, was never even floated. It was either Slytherin or Griffindor, and in the rare case where it was Slytherin, Dumbledore made some last minute changes and gave it to Griffindor anyway (which, if I was a Slytherin, I'd totally blame on nepotism, as the headmaster keeps changing the rules to let his own House win...).
Finding out that Hufflepuff was a hotbed of magical innovation, as disparate magical traditions and styles tend to get shuffled into their ranks, as well as students who have difficulties with some traditional practices and have to come up with 'work-arounds' to accomplish the same things, would be neat, and make Hufflepuff seem a bit less like 'the place we dump the slow kids.'
Registered: Aug 2006
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posted
Well, a Hufflepuff WAS chosen as the Hogwarts Triwizard champion. You can't ignore that. But ut is true that J.K. Rowling didn't do a very good job of making Hufflepuff stand out.
Also, I agree the initial definition of Slytherin was definitely misleading. I always thought the whole "pure-blood" thing that started being prominent in the second book was a bad imposition of our modern sensibilities on the Potter world. What's the ultimate evil? Racism! Prejudice! Nothing worse than that, right? I liked the idea that the "bad" was naked ambition. Evil people simply wanting power and riches and taking it by force because they can. In the end, it seems to me that Voldemort was more of a selfish-ambitious type than a racist, and that he was mainly using the racism of Slytherin-types to achieve his particular ends. But the abrupt switch in Slytherin character from the first book to the second and onward just felt ham-handed to me, like "how can I make the villain most evil in the minds of my likely readers - Western kids who have felt reasonably secure their whole lives?"
-------------------- Chaim Mattis Keller ckeller@nyc.rr.com Legion-Reference-File Lad
From: New York, NY, USA | Registered: Nov 2003
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Set
There's not a word yet, for old friends who've just met.
posted
With the 'mid-season revelations' that Snape and / or Tom Riddle were 'half-bloods,' the overt pureblood racism felt a little too much on the nose of a Hitler-was-part-Jewish sort of comparison.
Whether it be the 'self-loathing Jew' meme or the closeted politician promoting an anti-gay agenda trend, the 'those people are their own worst enemy' thing gets floated around as an excuse for being unsympathetic to various plights, and it's something that I didn't think really fit the theme of the novels, even if Rowling probably just meant for it to feel ironic, particularly that some of the purest of the purebloods (the Malfoy family) ended up more or less defecting at the end.
Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:Originally posted by Set: One isn't 'brave' in a vacuum. Something (generally something bad...) has to happen, before bravery becomes a factor in a situation.
A counter-example: one can be pro-actively brave in the face of risk one takes in a new venture.
While a current situation might not be "bad" in any sense, improvements can still be made, but some significant risks may be necessary in achieving them. For example, though from our modern plumbing viewpoint we might feel otherwise, having to pump water or fetch it from the river every day was not "bad" at the time, it was just normal.
From: Manhattan, NY | Registered: May 2011
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quote:Originally posted by Shining Son: Emily, I'd definitely call myself a fan, but I guess not so much to the point where I've joined Pottermore yet. How is it?
One thing put me off: I believe you have to take a test and be sorted into a house based on it? I don't care for what I assume the test would be like (the kind of thing that's been on the internet forever and that I've never done), and for it to be mandatory just made me pass on the whole thing.
Have I been wrong about that, or have they changed it?
It is required to take the test to continue past Chapter 7 of the first book. If you are strongly attach to a particular house, you can try to manipulate it to get the house you desire. I knew I would be a Hufflepuff (yellow is my favorite color and I am very kind in real life) so I answered honestly.
I think the four houses contain aspects reflect different types of heroism and villainy. I think Hufflepuff reflects more of a "greatness thrust upon them" individual. Peter from the Chronicles of Narnia is a perfect example of Hufflepuff heroics, loyalty unwavering and completely accepting of the situation he was thrown into. It is not a coincidence that Cedric's last name is Diggory, he was named after the professor the Pevensie siblings stayed with during the war. I think the death of Cedric Diggory might reflect the Christian undertones in Rowling's writing, in that by dying Cedric conquered death.
Ravenclaw heroes are more intellectual, but are needed and respected in society. According to Pottermore, they have supplied the Wizarding World with many inventors and ministers. Luna Lovegood was the only non-Gryffindor to fight in the Ministry of Magic in The Order of the Phoenix. Many Gryffindors have dated Ravenclaws, including Harry Potter, so there probably are good relations between the two houses.
Zacharias Smith is the most obvious example of a Hufflepuff villain; he doubts Harry Potter and decides to save himself instead of fighting. He would rather have a guarantee that he will survive the war than risk his life, despite the fact that it was Hufflepuff that asked if they could stay and fight. Ravenclaw has produced quite a few villainous characters in the series, so I will use Cho Chang's friend as my example. She betrayed Dumbledore's Army because she was worried that her mother would lose her job. The Gryffindors punish her severely for treason, but Cho Chang insists that her friend had to make the practical choice. I think that sums up the main difference between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw.
-------------------- Go with the good and you'll be like them; go with the evil and you'll be worse than them.- Portuguese Proverb
From: Illinois | Registered: Jun 2010
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I don't want to read a book online anyway so if everything else on the site is available without taking the test I'll think about checking it out again.
For me it's not a question of manipulating the outcome of the test, I don't want to take it or be sorted at all. Just as I've never taken any of the other billions of internet tests looking to categorize me over the years. They're apparently great fun for other people, and that's fine, but it's not for me.
From: Manhattan, NY | Registered: May 2011
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posted
Interesting analysis on the Houses, Set. It WOULD have been good to see more Slytherins "seeing the light", as they saw their ambition had totally lead them down the wrong path.
Re: the pure-blood thing, I read somewhere that the number of pure-blood families had been severely dwindling down over the years. The inclusions of people like Snape in Slytherin, despite not being pure-blood, is a good example of how even Slytherin House was forced to adapt over time. A "civil war" in Slytherin House towards the end would have been an interesting exploration of this.
quote:Originally posted by Set: Reading series that aren't finished yet (Wheel of Time, Harry Potter, etc.) just gives me time to *think* about the story, and that's never good, because I tend to come up with 'ties-everything-together' endings, and the really, real authors inevitably abandon half of the subplots they introduce and go somewhere else, leaving me feeling cheated.
Kind of off-topic, but Power Boy and I are big Wheel of Time fans too. And I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that both Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson had planned/are planning to NOT tie everything up. Which, given the kudzu plots sprouting up left and right, is probably the realistic outcome anyway.
posted
Shining Son, I suggest that you register for an account, go through the first few sections, and see what you think. If you don't like it, you can stop playing (Pottermore has admitted that lots of people don't play past the first few chapters). If you send me a PM, I will give you my username so you can Friend me. I have earned over a thousand points on Pottermore.
-------------------- Go with the good and you'll be like them; go with the evil and you'll be worse than them.- Portuguese Proverb
From: Illinois | Registered: Jun 2010
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posted
This actually confused me, I hadn't heard till this moment that any part of Pottermore was any kind of game.
I thought it was sort of a "fan site plus", meaning not only are all these people who love the material interacting and commenting about it, but the author herself is adding official material to supplement the books.
From: Manhattan, NY | Registered: May 2011
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Hyperpath: Email this page to someone!
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