The End of Harry Potter

Thursday August 2, 2007

Atheism and the Afterlife in the Potterverse

I’m at the end of my maiden voyage here on Beliefnet, and I’ve had a great time.

In addition to the fun I’ve had chatting with Orson about the Harry Potter series, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the high quality of the readers' comments. Not only is there a high signal-to-noise ratio, but even when disagreeing, people are generally very polite. As a result, reading the feedback has turned into an unexpected pleasure.

In fact, while reading the last series of comments about how different readers became disenchanted with books in the past, I realized that devoted readers and religious believers have something in common: Faith.

Llyralei suggested (very politely) that I was being a little lazy as a reader when I complained that Rowling’s rules of magic seemed ill-defined, or contradictory, or, in some cases, non-existent. She encouraged me to use my imagination. The implication being that I should work harder to invent explanations as to why everything in the books makes sense.

In general, I think this is good advice. It’s the reader’s job to take the pieces and put them together. The reader is supposed to draw conclusions and fill in some of the blank spaces in any story.

However, it’s the author’s job to make sure that there are enough pieces. And that they fit together. And that once they’re assembled, that a sensible picture is revealed, and not just a bodged-together mélange of Dobby-ex-machina.

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Filed Under: Harry Potter, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Orson Scott Card, Pat Rothfuss

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Friday July 27, 2007

What Civilization Does Harry Potter Create?

By Orson Scott Card

Spoiler alert: This post reveals the ending of Book Seven.

So we’ve lived in J.K. Rowling’s moral universe for a decade now, seven volumes worth. Where did she take us, and to the degree that we have been reshaped (or reaffirmed) by that moral universe, what has she made of us?

What hath Harry Potter wrought?

In a response to my previous post, Janet Zuk wrote: “I also do not think that Harry truly represents a "Christ" figure in the books, and more especially in Book 7. I do however think that there is much evidence that the characters act in the spirit of Christ.”

Zuk then makes a sound case for this. And we could speculate for a long time about just how much Christianity permeates the moral universe of J.K. Rowling.

One does not have to be a Christian, or a believer of any kind, to have a strong influence from the public religion of the culture one grew up in. Unlike Philip Pullman, for instance, who is so obsessed with Christianity that he spent the third volume of His Dark Materials making savage, one-sided attacks on a religion very much like the good old C of E, J.K. Rowling seems to ignore Christianity itself, including only the superficially Christian aspects of Christmas — the gift giving, the decorations, the bangers, but not much in the way of mangers or angels.

In fact, though, one can see in this, not hostility, but rather a kind of reverence.

If Rowling thought of Christianity as a quaint cultural phenomenon merely, she might have been tempted to have funny stuff from Christian folk culture as well as pre- and extra-Christian European folk culture.

For instance, I can imagine a version of Harry Potter where, right along with the castle ghosts, all the students had funny little guardian angels paired with devils trying to turn them toward right or wrong.

And along with the portraits on the walls, the Virgin Mary might be popping up in sightings everywhere — in woodgrain patters on furniture, in figurines found by schoolchildren on the Hogwarts playing field.

There could be a professor of hagiography, teaching students which saint to pray to for particular miracles to counter spells and curses.

Do you see how easy it would have been? Now, one could speculate that Rowling’s motive in not literalizing Christian folk beliefs in the Harry Potter universe was to keep from alienating Christian readers. But considering how some Christian readers responded to the book as it is, one could only conclude that any such aim was only partially successful.

In fact, though, there is no reason to posit some venal motive for Rowling’s choices here. She knew that for most of the worldwide anglophone culture (for she certainly was not thinking of translations of her first book when she wrote it and was thrilled with a 500-copy first printing), witches and magic were part of the cultural memory but not a matter of serious belief.

Witches were part of Halloween, or of long-past superstitions. It was fun to for her to explain just when the Wizarding World went “underground” and show wizards and witches as living among us yet blissfully unfamiliar with our ways. Her story was funny and scary by turns.

Yet she never even approached the line between these lightly-held beliefs and the more deeply-held beliefs of Christianity. This says nothing about what she herself believes about particular doctrines of Christianity, but it says much about what she treats with respect.

The result was that most readers were immediately comfortable in the world of Harry Potter and stayed that way. Only a few people in our culture really believe in witches of the Halloween or Salem varieties (and those mostly condemned the books). So she could redefine them how she wished.

I have had people ask me why, as a believing (nontraditional) Christian, I didn’t show God taking action in the worlds of my science fiction. My answer was simple enough: I don’t take sacred things and make light of them. When I take stories from scripture, I treat the source material with great respect; and, above all, I do not invent cool stuff for God to do in my stories.

As with Lord of the Rings, there might be an offstage purposer (Gandalf’s assertion that certain things were “meant” to take place), never named or seen; but his hand remains invisible, and the mortals are left to work things out pretty much on their own, with no certainty about what was “meant” or even fated to take place.

Rowling keeps about the same distance from God that Tolkien did in his great fantasy work. That is, she is willing to have quite astonishing confluences of events that lead to fortunate outcomes. Cynics might call them coincidences, but not so, or not in the pejorative sense. If Harry had just happened to get the want that was the twin of Voldemort’s, we might groan; but instead we are told that the wand chooses the wizard, so the confluence of events is not random coincidence, it is instead the natural outcome of what has gone before.

When Rowling first told us that it was “love” that saved Harry Potter from Voldemort’s killing curse, I almost gagged. Oh, no! I inwardly cried. She’s going to sink into maudlin banality!

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Friday July 27, 2007

Harry Potter Fans: Let's Not Play Find-the-Jesus

By Patrick Rothfuss

Spoiler Alert: Jesus Dies.

Fair warning: I'm going to speak plainly about book seven here. Also, I'm going to talk about what happens in the end of the Bible, and give away some of the major plot points of the Tao Te Ching. So if you're worried about having the endings ruined, you'll probably want to go finish those books first and come back later.

Harry as Jesus

I agree with Orson. I think we can very comfortably put the whole issue of Potter-as-Christ-Figure to bed.

When answering the question "Is Harry a Christ figure?" Orson exhibits wisdom and moderation, giving a qualified no. I, however, being neither moderate or wise, am willing to go all the way and answer with a unhesitating "no." Extra no. Double-plus no.

Yes, yes, there are a few similarities. Yes Harry is willing to sacrifice himself for others. He dies (kinda) and comes back.

But after that, you really have to start scrabbling to come up with connections. I spotted a chart where someone lists all the multifarious similarities between Harry and Jesus. The list includes the fact that they both had father figures. (Harry: Dumbledore. Jesus: God the Father.) They both suffered. (Harry: Cruciatus curse. Jesus: Hung on the cross.) Both of them even had a decent into the "nether regions." (Harry descends into the Chamber of Secrets. Jesus descends into hell.)

Well, this brilliant and insightful list got me thinking. Last night I had a descent into my basement where I did some laundry. It was dark down there, and I stubbed my toe really hard. (You know how much that hurts when you bang your little toe? I bet it's as least as bad as the Cruciatus curse.) Then my dad called me on the phone and I realized that I have a father figure too! Wow! What are the odds?

So does this make me a Christ figure? No. Anyone thick enough to believe that would be really shocked to hear the words that came out of my mouth after I stubbed my toe. Trust me, it wasn't anything so noble and plaintive as, "Eloi Eloi...."

Of all the irritating literary games people play, Find-the-Jesus is one of the most wearying to me. Not every book has Christ symbolism. Let it go.

People use stairs. People suffer. People have fathers. People make noble sacrifices. And, in fantastic stories, people come back from the dead. Odin did it. Osirus did it. Sherlock Holmes did it. Buffy did it. Spock did it. Hell... Voldemort died and came back. It takes more than that to make a Christ figure.

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Filed Under: Harry Potter, Orson Scott Card, Pat Rothfuss

posted by Patrick Rothfuss @11:24am Permalink Email This Add to:

Wednesday July 25, 2007

The Moral Universe of Harry Potter

By Orson Scott Card

(I’m assuming that anyone reading this essay has already finished "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows." If you haven’t, stop reading now, and get back to J.K. Rowling so you’ll know what I’m talking about, and I won’t spoil the story for you.)

Until this seventh book, the answer to “Is Harry Potter a Christ figure” has been “no.”

And even now, despite the obvious similarity, I still say a qualified no.

Yes, Harry does voluntarily go to his death in order to save, not the lives of his fellow war fighters (for no one believes that Voldemort will actually keep his word), but rather the future of the human race, from domination by irresistible evil. And he does so knowing that his “father”—Dumbledore—wishes him to do it.

Yes, after being slain by the evil enemy, he spends a short time in a sort of nonce world and then returns to life. In a sense he has already beaten Voldemort, but there is yet a final battle between them, in which Potter is triumphant and the world is saved. Not only that, but he continues to bear, not the stigmata, but still a stigma—the lightning scar.

But these similarities are relatively very slight, and such hero-sacrifice myths are common to many cultures.

Let’s take just a moment to note the huge dissimilarities:

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posted by Orson Scott Card @ 3:24pm Permalink Email This Add to:

Tuesday July 24, 2007

Reading 'Deathly Hallows' by Candlelight

By Patrick Rothfuss

The day "Deathly Hallows" came out, I was a family vacation in the distant northern corner of Wisconsin. I found myself in a cabin with no internet. There was a small town with no library. No public computer terminals. No coffeeshop and no WIFI hotspot. No cell phone reception.

I considered sending my response to Orson's blog by homing pigeon or owl, but neither of those were available either.

But despite all the things this small town lacked, it had a bookstore. And that bookstore had a copy of the book.

On Saturday there was a thunderstorm and the power went out. After 30 minutes my laptop battery went dead.

So I pulled out book seven and read it by candlelight. Amazingly, the book worked just fine without DSL, WIFI, AC or DC.

This is why I love books.

Here is my belated post. It doesn't contain any spoilers about book seven, save this: Be not afraid.

Ars Ioco: The Art of the Joke

Orson's right. The Harry Potter series started dark.

However, I'll stick to my statement that the grim elements weren't really the focus of the book. Not only was most of the early violence cartoony at best, but the story itself was a nice mix of drama, action, mystery, and humor.

As the series has progressed, the humor has fallen by the wayside. And I have to say I miss it. Not because I have a problem with a grim story, but because reading raw tragedy is like eating a block of baker's chocolate: profoundly unpalatable.

The first Harry Potter book reminded me, at its best moments, of Roald Dahl's stories, like The BFG and Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Dahl was a master of writing stories that were grim and funny at the same time. His humor was witty, ridiculous, and brilliantly absurdist at times.

There were flashes of that in Rowling's first book. Harry's room under the stairs, the behavior of the Dursleys, and, my personal favorite, when he was given a toothpick as a Christmas present. All of it ridiculous and horrible and absurd. That is the root of humor. I smiled and chuckled. It was lovely.

I think the reason the later books lack humor is because Rowling changed her style. She moved more toward realism. When that happened, the ridiculous, absurd humor she had a knack for didn't fit into the story anymore.

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Filed Under: Harry Potter, Orson Scott Card, Pat Rothfuss

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Saturday July 21, 2007

A Third of the Way In ...

By Orson Scott Card

Editor's Note: This blog post reveals plot points in the first third of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows."

Good people doing bad things — or rumored to have done them.

Bad people doing noble things — or were those people ever really bad?

I got the book at eleven this morning, and now, at nine-twenty, I’ve read through page 273. So if you’ve read farther than I have, good for you, and remember that I don’t know all that you know; if you haven’t read as far, then I warn you, I intend to speak candidly, and I might tell you more than you wish to hear.

Though truth to tell, I know little more than I did when I started reading. Rowling is doling out new information only in small bits. Considering how many horcruxes Voldemort created, she is spending an awful lot of time on collecting a single one of them. It is hard to believe at this point that she can possibly end this volume, let alone the series, in the number of pages she has left.

Then again, there’s this I know as a novelist: When you near the end of a massive work, if you’ve done your preparation well enough, then things can happen very rapidly indeed. Without the need to explain things, you can simply let events unfold.

And now that I think about it, Rowling has done quite a good job, in the first third of this book, of reminding us of the key events of the previous books — the things we must remember and keep in mind for this story to make sense.

But books are not just a process of preparing us for the ending. Every chapter, every scene, should have a purpose in itself. What has Rowling put into our memories in the first 273 pages of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows"?

If you haven’t read this far, then stop. I’m not reviewing this book to decide whether to recommend it or not. I’m discussing it critically, to talk about its effects. I’m assuming that anyone who reads what I’m writing here has already experienced the first 273 pages. If you haven’t, then behave yourself and stop reading my essay and get back to Rowling’s novel where you belong.

It’s All About Trust

Harry thinks he’s searching for the truth, but that isn’t really it at all. He keeps being frustrated because other people speak to him as if he should choose what to believe about Albus Dumbledore. Though he knows that Rita Skeeter’s stories are all half-truths and distortions, he also knows that Skeeter does seek a core of truth in her reporting. Her Quill may write down a souped-up, soap opera version, putting the most scandalous possible spin on everything — but the thing she’s spinning does have a core of truth.

So Harry feels that he must find out the truth about Dumbledore. Why was his younger sister imprisoned by his mother — or was she? Why would Dumbledore tolerate such a thing — or did he? Skeeter is accusing Dumbledore of perhaps having something to do with the death of his sister — did he? Why did Dumbledore fight with his younger brother, who broke Albus’s nose at their sister’s funeral? Why didn’t Dumbledore defend himself magically against the blow?

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Filed Under: Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling, Orson Scott Card

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Friday July 20, 2007

Will Harry Die?

By Orson Scott Card

Editor's Note: This blog post does not reveal any plot points in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows."

"Jane, you ignorant sl--..."

Oh, wait, I'm showing my age. Just because I'm in a two-person debate in public doesn't mean I should make a connection with Dan Aykroyd's and Jane Curtin's parody of Point/Counterpoint on Saturday Night Live. Who could possibly think that was funny?

In fact, even when that sketch first appeared on SNL, I didn't fully get it because I had never seen Point/Counterpoint. I knew they were making fun of something, but I didn't know what. I thought it was funny, but mostly because of Aykroyd's deadpan delivery of a semi-shocking word -- a personal attack in the midst of the news.

Humor is hard to bring off, and parody is harder. Which brings me to Hermione and the house elves.

More Serious? Or Less Funny?

Patrick makes the case that the Harry Potter series has been getting more serious in the later books, perhaps leading toward tragedy -- even, possibly, the tragedy of Harry Potter's own death.

But I'm not sure the series itself has become that much more "serious."

Patrick's impression is correct -- the series has become markedly less funny. But is that because Rowling is leading us toward tragedy? Or because she simply ran out of funny stuff to do?

Let's not forget how grim the series has been from the start. Even though the Dursleys were played as a satire on suburban propriety (gee, a writer who's an underemployed single mom -- could she possibly have come to resent people who have a husband, wife, and fat little boy in their suburban house?), the fact is that Harry Potter is an orphan living with a heartless uncle and aunt.

Why? Because, we discover, his parents were murdered. A cheery start -- shouldn't all children's books begin that way?

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Monday July 16, 2007

The End Is Near

By Patrick Rothfuss

I knew anticipation of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" had reached ridiculous levels when one of my friends uttered the words: "Accio Book Seven!"

What was truly surprising is that instead of being shunned by everyone in the coffee shop where we were talking, my friend's geeky outburst spurred an hour's worth of intelligent educated guessery about what was likely to happen in the final book. Everyone, it seems, has a pet theory or two...

The Obligatory Speculation: "The Boy Who Died."

The main question, of course, is whether or not Harry is going to die. I think Orson is right on about that. However, I'm going to have to go against him when he says that Rowling hasn't laid the groundwork for Harry's death.

The thing is, when you give your main character a title like "The Boy Who Lived" it's like painting a target on his back. Throw in a prophecy and start calling him "The Chosen One" and...well...let's just say that I'd hate to have Harry's life insurance premiums.

It's like the character from Russian folklore, Kashchey the Deathless. Stop me if you've heard this one, but Kashchey, clever bloke that he is, hides his soul (or his death, depending on the version of the story) away in an object so that he can't be killed. Despite these careful preparations, Kashchey snuffs it at the end of pretty much every story where he makes an appearance.

And really, nobody should be surprised by that. When a character comes into a story with a name like "The Deathless," most sensible readers start looking around nervously, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Add to this the fact that Rowling's books have been growing progressively darker, full of death and loss...and I think it might be fair to guess that Rowling might try to end the series as a tragedy.

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Filed Under: fantasy novels, Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling, Orson Scott Card, Pat Rothfuss

posted by Patrick Rothfuss @ 6:23pm Permalink Email This Add to:

Monday July 16, 2007

Harry Potter Reaches the End

By Orson Scott Card

A few days from now, J.K. Rowling will bring the Harry Potter series to an end.

Well, actually, she brought it to an end months ago. But by the end of this week, we will finally find out what end she decided on.

I hear all kinds of speculation. Some examples:

1. Because Harry Potter is a Christ Figure, he has to die.

I think this is just silly. First, Harry Potter is not a Christ-figure in the allegorical sense — Rowling has not been making his life parallel the life of Jesus in any significant way. Indeed, if there’s any Christ-figure in the books, it’s Harry’s mum. She’s the one who gave her life to save him.

And when it comes to resurrection, Voldemort is the main resurrectee in this series — please don’t tell me anyone thinks he represents Jesus of Nazareth. I think he bears more resemblance to Hitler of Austria or Stalin of Georgia or Pol Pot of Khmer.

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Filed Under: Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling, Orson Scott Card, Pat Rothfuss

posted by Orson Scott Card @10:52am Permalink Email This Add to:

Monday July 16, 2007

Bio: Patrick Rothfuss

Patrick Rothfuss is the author of the acclaimed first book The Name of the Wind, a fantasy novel which details the adventures of a young magician. He lives in central Wisconsin where he teaches at the local university. In his free time Pat writes a satirical humor column, practices civil disobedience, and dabbles in alchemy. His website is www.patrickrothfuss.com.

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posted by Beliefnet @10:50am Permalink Email This Add to:

Monday July 16, 2007

Bio: Orson Scott Card

Best known for his science fiction novels "Ender's Game" and "Ender's Shadow," award-winning writer Orson Scott Card is also a committed Latter-day Saint. He has written screenplays for animated children's videos from the New Testament and Book of Mormon, and is active in his LDS community.

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