Comments | axmxz: (без темы)

axmxz

(Untitled)

Aug 22, 2005 01:58

So I was re-reading "Monday Starts on Saturday" just now and suddenly realized something about Harry Potter. Several somethings, actually.

( Musings on Harry Potter and random Monday spoilers )

russian, thought of the day, humor, random weirdness

Comments 26

vivelabagatelle August 22 2005, 00:35:27 UTC

Interesting, verrry interesting.

Even more interesting, to my mind, is that the case where HP seems to hold most resemblance to another fictional work is the one case where Rowling casn most reasonably be acquitted of plagiarism. (I wonder is she DOES happen to read Russian?)

atalantapendrag August 22 2005, 01:04:04 UTC

According to Amazon.co.uk, it was released in English in the UK in the late 70s.

axmxz August 22 2005, 01:06:11 UTC

Well, technically, it's not impossible that she'd heard of it, or even read it before conceiving of Harry Potter. She wouldn't even have to read Russian: an English translation of the novel existed since 1976. A bad one, to be sure, but it did exist...

atalantapendrag August 22 2005, 01:03:03 UTC

Dammit, you've made me want to read it, but the cheapest copy (in English) I can find is nearly $50.

axmxz August 22 2005, 01:08:41 UTC

No problem. Check out for the brand-spanking-new translation, freshly off the press here.

atalantapendrag August 22 2005, 01:14:35 UTC

Wishlisted for when I have a bit of money to spare. Or if anyone on teh intarwebs wants to get me a birthday present *snerk*

axmxz August 22 2005, 01:19:07 UTC

Thread 8

inkywaters August 22 2005, 09:53:12 UTC

That's hilarious.

axmxz August 22 2005, 10:22:40 UTC

The most hilarious part of the book for me has always been the scene where the main character attempts to magic himself a snack. He gets it wrong the first time and then decides to correct it through a series of "consecutive transfigurations." What follows is Transfiguration on steroids.

hamsterwoman August 22 2005, 17:08:31 UTC

Wow! I never though about it that way, but, yeah... some of the parallels are quite interesting (though I must say, I can't really see the Junta/Snape. I am, however, suddenly taken with a Vybegallo / Umbridge parallel...)

And, hmm, maybe the Ponedeljnik connection explains my fondness for K2K...

axmxz August 22 2005, 19:31:10 UTC

I think that if one divorces oneself mentally from the Alan Rickman visuals of Severus Snape, his similarity to Junta - his BOOK similarity, as opposed to movie or fanon - is quite strong. And Snape, if we will recall, is not all that tall - Sirius is supposed to have been much taller.

I think Vybegallo is the entire collective of incopetent/dangerous DaDa professors. He doesn't actually teach people squat; he constantly endangers the university, often by setting loose magical creatures (memento consumer cadavers), and yet he is tolerated, because "no one wants to get involved."

You have a fondness for neutrinos? That is admirable. :)

hamsterwoman August 23 2005, 01:09:48 UTC

Hmm... I'm possibly remembering Junta or reading book Snape differently. Even visually, I think Junta is usually described as elegant and immaculate, which doesn't seem to apply to Snape (as JKR writes him, at least). The basic disconnect for me, though, is that Junta not only wants to be first at everything, but his superiority as a wizard is apparently widely recognized, and a lot of his perversity seems to be either posturing/amiable ritual (dueling and jumping around on chairs, e.g.) or simply enjoying being a pain in the ass (writing in incomprehensible script). On the other hand, Snape's perversity seems to have a lot to do with the giant chip on his shoulder from *his* superiority as a wizard not being sufficiently widely acknowledged. So while there are definitely some similarities there (and if I had to map Snape to anyone in Ponedeljnik it *would* probably be Junta), I think there are differences in what I see as the two characters' core ( ... )

axmxz August 23 2005, 01:52:55 UTC

Yeah, personal grooming is what really drives a wedge between Snape and Junta in my mind. Junta knew how to keep himself pretty. So not only did he know he was *the* shit, he knew how to make everyone else into thinking that. Whether by scare tactics or otherwise. And he did have a friend, Theodor Kivrin, even though all they seemed to do was fight. Incidentally, who would he be in this "Rowling stole from the Strugatskis" fantasy? Surely not Sprout, even for all the Hufflepuffiness of his students.

Umbridge had some genuinely impressive cruelty in her. With Vybegallo, you never quite know whether he's simply in this business for the press (Lockhart), the influence (Umbridge) or outright sabotage and mayhem (Crouch, Quirrell).

I have not heard of the Knight 2 King theory. Thank you for enlightening me. :)

Thread 13