Literary parallels, Time Turner, Snape, misc

[Tabouli]

No: HPFGUIDX 31715

Cornflower:
> I don't think allusions need to be intentional to be interesting, 
and whether they are right or not, they let us look at the text in 
new ways.<

> If allusions take away an author's creativity then most major 
authors aren't too creative...let's see for starters there's 
Shakespeare, that ultimate plagiarist. He stole stories from 
everywhere, but still did okay in the way of creativity I'd say.<

Hang on, I said I *like* drawing parallels with other literary sources, I do it myself, and as a writer I certainly don't claim to be borrowing-free.  I just think that forcing tenuous parallels between one's favorite casts and plots can be taken too far for my personal tastes (see Nancy Stouffer, or that book on HP by Elizabeth Schaefer where she forces all manner of ridiculous Biblical parallels for her own ends: the invisibility cloak=the shroud of Turin???).  As for the intentional bit, I was talking about stealing an entire plot and cast of characters, not making mild allusions here and there.  If you're essentially recreating an old story, a la Robin McKinley's two novelisations of "Beauty and the Beast", or Baz Luhrmann's "Romeo and Juliet", you'd hope the author/filmmaker realises that this is what s/he is doing and acknowledges it.  Accidental plagiarism to this degree is possible (e.g. LMM fans might have comments about 'The Blue Castle' and 'The Ladies of Missolonghi' (sp?)) but unlikely.

I wasn't meaning to open the ol' plagiarism can o' worms and start a raging debate about ye olde "there are no original plots in the world", "good authors borrow, great authors steal", and what is creativity and the well-worn Shakespeare defence.  Besides, Shakespeare is a good illustration of my point.  He stole his plots wholesale, but he did it deliberately and knowingly and added something more to the stories.  I don't think JKR is stealing anyone's plot wholesale.  She's got a more smorgasbord approach to her borrowings and allusions, a bit here, a bit there, and then cleverly uniting the lot into what's essentially a traditional English school series format, following her characters through school with one book per year.

Rita:
> I thought for a while and came up with a feeble guess: Hermione's Time Turner was set to put 
her 20 feet west of where normal-time-she was (that is, where she had been at the time she is travelling to).<

My theory was much more simple - the Time Turner always puts her into the entrance hall cupboard.  The entrance hall would conveniently be empty for most of the day after breakfast, and is presumably quite central.  By discreetly making sure it was empty at a certain time, judicious use of the Time Turner would enable Hermione to use it as many "times" as she needed to.  I always thought she was gasping when she popped up after that class in PoA because she'd just run up from the Entrance Hall.  Mind you, I've never checked this out to see if it's plausible (too lazy at the moment).

Penny (on Harry's top 5 influential people):
> I'm surprised no one has yet argued for Snape.  I suspect he *will* get added to this list of influences on 
Harry before the series is out.  :--)

Hmm, yes, I suspect so too.  Or perhaps he already has influenced Harry a lot in some way, we just don't know how yet.  From all the hints we have so far, Harry's life is *definitely* connected with Snape's in some important way through something that happened with James.  And there must be more to it than what we've heard so far (jealous of James' Quidditch performance, James saved Snape's life)... Hagrid's discomfort in PS/SS in itself makes it clear that Snape definitely has *some* valid reason for hating Harry, which must obviously be counterbalanced by *some* competing but stronger motivation to protect him.  (Tabouli valiantly resists the temptation to proclaim from the deck of her favorite ship).

Aja:
> if the wand chooses the wizard, the wand containing the
> feather of the noble and pure Fawkes chose Tom Riddle?

For the same reason that the wise and responsible Dumbledore let Harry see the Mirror of Erised and a trio of first year students complete the tasks... it's all part of some great Master Plan!

Rita:
> How can the identity of the Death Eaters be secret from each other, as Karkaroff claimed 
and good management suggests?

All in all, secrecy seems a bit lax in the Wizarding World.  Presumably this is for the benefit of us, the readers, who need information, but really, announcing far and wide that Snape betrayed V and swapped sides (thought this could be an ingenious ruse), proclaiming the names of DEs in a public graveyard, Crouch Junior telling Harry the blow by blow detail of what he was up to... tsk tsk.

And yes, surely that secret chamber in Malfoy Manor will have its day eventually!

Tabouli.



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