Laughing Sirius, Meaning of Religion, Signif. of Names

[mjollner]

No: HPFGUIDX 34413

Hoo, boy!  Too many posts to keep up with these days, but I'd like to 
contribute a bit to the following...

(1) Laughing Sirius

>SpyGameFan wrote:
>I never was quite sure -- maybe I missed the explanation in the 
>book -- why Sirius was laughing hysterically after Peter blew up the 
>street full of Muggles and turned into a rat. Anyone know?

Sirius had come *thiiiiis* close to catching the one responsible for 
the Potters' deaths, only to have said guilty party completely turn 
the tables on him and frame him quite publicly (and brilliantly).    

When I studied acting waaaay back in undergrad, this type of 
"opposite" reaction was one we were encouraged always to consider when 
thinking of how to approach a role.  Say you are playing a character 
in a scene who has just flunked an important exam and whose friends 
have asked what score she/he got.  You might take the most obvious 
choice and play the scene with a gloomy face.  Or you  might cry.  But 
it would be much more interesting to put on a queer sort of smile or 
even laugh when you tell your friends you failed.  That would be a 
much more interesting choice, one that would flesh out the character 
and give him/her more depth than the "obvious" choices.  Playing the 
opposites does this.  

When I read that part, I thought the hysterical laughter was the most 
believable response Sirius could have: he had just lost people he 
loved directly because of the person he recommended to protect them, 
he knew he'd been *had* by said betrayer and he knew there was not a 
damned thing he could do about it.  The laughter only plays up the 
pathos of the situation and the fact that Sirius fully understands its 
irony and hopelessness.  Really, he's beyond anything rational at that 
point.

(2) Meaning of Religion

>Chris Parnell wrote:
>I'm rather guessing that the answer is that JKR has, as much as
>possible, excised religion from her tale, for the simple reason that
>any way you go, you'll have problems in such a setting.

and 

>On all fronts, religion is losing its excessive moral control over
>people's lives, and that is a good thing.
(major snipping)

'K, I'm with you on that first part - addition of religious conflict 
in addition to all of the other conflicts going on in HP would only 
muddy the narrative without adding anything necessary.   

However, I have to disagree with you *big-time* on that second point! 
Christian fundamentalism is on the rise in the US and plays a greater 
role in politics here now than it has in years. I worked in politics 
and government for several years in the 1990s, and the pervasiveness 
of its influence was much stronger when I left than when I started.  
This situation certainly hasn't gotten any better with Shrubya's 
unfortunate election to the highest office in the land. <umm, so I 
guess it's apparent to what political party I *don't* belong!>

To illustrate the growing hold of fundamentalist Islam, V.S. Naipaul 
has written at least two books detailing his travels in Pakistan, 
Indonesia and Iran (and one other country whose name escapes me).  He 
wrote one in the 1970s, but his sequel/update from 1998 ("Beyond 
Belief: Islamic Excursions Among the Converted Peoples") is perhaps 
more immediately compelling.  

On a more emotional level -- choosing my words *very* carefully, don't 
want to think about the smoke I saw over my shoulder coming from the 
Pentagon on September 11 nor my soldier nephew currently interrogating 
Taliban in Guantanamo Bay -- one need only to have followed events of 
the past several months to realize that religion has NOT lost its 
control over some people's lives.

Yes, I'll leave it at that.

(3) Significance of Names

>vheggie wrote:
>1)Both Lucius and Severus were Roman leaders of one sort or another 
>(IIRC Severus lead troops in Britain, and Lucius was Caesar, 
>briefly) - any classical scholars out there able to drag up any 
>information on them?

I'm not a classical scholar, but I do work in a library, so I dug up 
some info on this.  I read in "The Amateur Historian's Guide to 
Medieval and Tudor London" the other day that the person responsible 
for starting construction of the wall around what was then Londinium 
was named Severus. A quick check of the Gale Group's "Biography 
Resource Center" gives this Roman empereror's full name as - are you 
ready for this??? - Lucius Septimius Severus!  He lived from 146 to 
211.

Mjollner, erstwhile actress/political flack/librarian