Children’s books, Snape, Homorphous Charm, Slytherin

[katzefan at yahoo.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 25316

My computer programs have been *very* uncooperative in last 48 
hours, so please please forgive me for putting in my 2 Knuts on 
the subject of children's literature rather on the late side.

I don't see why the HP series couldn't qualify as both
children's and adults' literature -- although sometimes I
think the category `children's books' is an extremely
arbitrary one, into which critics/reviewers/marketers toss books 
that they can't easily pigeonhole - or find the subject matter too
`immature' (I am, of course, leaving aside the really obvious 
children's books - you know, the ones with one sentence per 
page). Besides the HP books, I'm thinking of many of Robert
Heinlein's books, which were also consigned to this limbo, 
because they dealt with such unrealistic things as space and 
time travel, which surely are not *adult* subjects, right? :) 
As to the complexity of the later HP books, so what if kids miss a 
lot the first time around? There's nothing quite like the thrill
of reading something 3 or 4 years after the first time you cracked 
the book and suddenly seeing things you didn't see the first 
time.

On another topic, Penny and Bryce pointed out something 
interesting about the fact that Percy has a job but still lives at 
home - we just had an article in the local papers here about 
exactly that sort of thing, and the fact that, in some cultures,
it's not only *not* strange, it's expected, at least partly
because,as adults, they are expected now to help out their 
parents. And as one interviewee put it, if he left home for no 
apparent reason (i.e. he hadn't gotten married, nor gotten a job 
halfway across the country) friends and relatives would wonder 
what's wrong in the family that he would want to get away from 
his parents. 
The notion that leaving home = adulthood is one that is prevalent 
in Western Europe (and much of North America), but not 
necessarily throughout other cultures.

..Gwen wrote an impassioned defence of Snape, ending with 
>Okay. Tear me apart, I'm ready!
>Gwen

Give me a shout and I'll send a cat or two over to help you out, 
Gwen. I find Snape to be, without question, *the* most engimatic 
- and thereby fascinating - character JKR has created (not 
particularly nice, just fascinating). Just when you want to believe 
he really is a [expletive deleted] Death Eater, he pulls something 
you weren't expecting - like protecting Harry in Book 1, like
having turned against the Death Eaters `at great personal
risk' (as we find out in Book 4) and various examples in 
between. Most of the other characters, good or bad, could switch, 
given the right conditions, but at least for the moment readers 
have a fair idea who's a good guy and who's not ... except
when it comes to Snape.


>From:  blpurdom at y...
>Subject:  Arithmancy/OotP/Evil Draco 2. Timing for OotP
>I'm not at all surprised it's taking a while.  (July 2002) She's 
>famous now, she wrote two Comic Relief books, the touring for 
>GoF alone must have taken her ages, and she's been keeping 
>an eye on the movie production.  Plus, casting for CoS is taking 
>place now and soon she'll be on chat shows around the world 
>in connection with the PS/SS movie release.  Considering that 
>she used to write in a cafe which she probably can't get near 
>anymore without being recognized, I'm amazed that we recently 
>received word that the manuscript is at the publisher's.

Is it?!! YEE-HAA!!


Parker said:
> >They do cover the Homorphous Charm,
> >which turns a werewolf back into a
> >person,
Kelly Hurt said:
> If this is real, why doesn't Dumbledore cure Lupin?

Keep in mind who was performing this spell - Lockhart, the guy 
with forty-two 90-watt teeth and no real capability. This is the guy 
who stole other people's activities and passed them off as his 
own in his books. It would be just like him to yatter on about a 
charm that he actually knows little or nothing about. (I like 
Amanda's idea that the charm turns a werewolf back into his/her 
human form *temporarily* which would at least allow the 
community to know who it was.)


*************************************************

"For your information, Potter, asphodel and wormwood make a 
sleeping potion so powerful it is known as the Draught of Living 
Death. A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat and 
it will save you from most poisons. As for monkshood and 
wolfsbane, they are the same plant, which also goes by the 
name of aconite. Well? Why aren't you all copying that down?"
- Snape in PS/SS