Some Forever, Not for Better . . .

The last post I made in this old haunt of mine was in 2020 when I was just about to dive into a nostalgic orgy of Harry Potter reading and posting, but Ms. Rowling short-circuited that by unveiling her commitment to, what shall I call it? . . .the backlash against trans rights activism? . . .sternly patrolling ( Read more... )

How do Rowling and her collaborators Jack Thorne and John Tiffany use geometric patterns in the play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child?

( Geometry Is the Science of Correct Reasoning on Incorrect Figures-George Polya )

Triangles are magical. In structural engineering they are the only sided shape that can't be distorted or collapse at the joints. In drama they are always dynamic. Unlike quartets, which tend to settle into static pairs, triangles present the constant possibility of any two people uniting against the third. It is no wonder they are so often chosen ( Read more... )

Long, long ago, writers started realizing that if one pair of lovers is fun, two or more pairs can be even more fun. The most common geometric result of this realization is the quartet. It has long been a convention of plays, movies, and musicals to have the lead pair and the supporting pair, the serious pair and the comic pair, the mature pair and ( Read more... )

The simplest romance geometry of all is the pair. It is a perennial classic, used in works from Abelard and Heloise to a large percentage of fan fiction. You will never, ever spark a shipping debate if you limit your romantic potential to one guy and one gal--or two guys or two gals if your audience is accepting. If you want to really dig in and ( Read more... )

This is sort of a continuation of this post I wrote a couple of years ago, using the new information from Jo Rowling's post-Potter works to reflect back on her writing of romance in the Harry Potter series. I want to return to Rowling's comments in her 2014 interview with Emma Watson:

What I will say is that I wrote the Hermione/Ron relationship ( Read more... )

Once, a long time ago, I wrote in a "twelve unpopular opinions" meme post:

The Harry Potter series is simple and conventional as literature goes. It is rich but not deep, elaborate but not particularly challenging. These are not faults.

I still think that the Harry Potter series is simple and conventional as literature goes, rich, elaborate, and ( Read more... )

A year ago, in April of 2017, both author_by_night and torrent56 asked for my thoughts on the Harry Potter and the Cursed Child play. I didn't respond, partly because having only read the play and not seen it performed I didn't feel like my thoughts would be of interest, partly because I was busy with other things right then, but mostly because it had been so long since ( Read more... )

It feels really weird to be posting on LJ now. For one thing, I know hardly anybody will read it. Then there's that whole thing with Russia and their anti-gay persecution. I have had to agree to Livejournal's user agreement to keep this journal, which gives them the right to yank my LJ at any time without notice, because obviously I'm not going to ( Read more... )

In my recent post about reconsidering JK Rowling's writing of romance in the Harry Potter series in light of the additional information from her later works, I declared myself puzzled by the following words of Rowling's:

What I will say is that I wrote the Hermione/Ron relationship as a form of wish fulfillment.

I wrote:

And it is not quite clear ( Read more... )