Harry Potter names - tribute to Roald Dahl?

[feetmadeofclay]

No: HPFGUIDX 76739

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "ariadnemajic" <stevejjen at e...> 
wrote:
> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Wanda Sherratt" 
> <wsherratt3338 at r...> wrote:
> > <snip> His (Harry's)life is just too farcical in its blackness.  
> Yes, yes, I know that things that bad and worse happen in real 
life, 
> but this isn't real life. It isn't even just a novel; it's a fairy-
> tale novel (or it was, in the earlier books) and I feel sure that 
> Rowling meant her description of the Dursleys to be a black comedy, 
> not a serious expose about the things that go on behind the doors 
of 
> neat suburban houses.<snip>
> 

> OOTP feels bleak to me, that's the best word I can think of.  From 
> the dark House of Black, to Umbridge, to the basement of the MOM 
and 
> Sirius's death, the story took a turn down a different road. That's 
> not to say it isn't an equally important story, or that what 
happened 
> in OOTP isn't crucial to the big picture, I just missed the quirky 
> daily events that are so part of Harry's magical world.  
> Ariadne

Well you're not alone...

I think that is because fairytales are psychologically crude.  
Cinderella doesn't develop anorexia, descend into self abuse or 
prostitute herself because she wasn't loved as a child.  

We are able to hate the bad guys and glory when the little cinder 
girl triumphs. In really psychological tales of how pain affects 
people the triumphs are bitter sweet because they can't remove the 
pain of what has come before.  It is still there. The Scarlett Letter 
is like that.  You never get away from Hester's own view of herself 
or the effect the persecution has had on her.

The problem with HP is that Harry has been from books 1-4 (in my 
opinion anyway) a cinderella figure with his stunning ability to be 
free from any desire to gain Petunia's love or a punishing lack of 
selfconfidence.  He's even rather bold with Petunia when she's dying 
is new school clothes.  He hates them and encourages us to hate them 
too.  Just like we hate Cinderella's step sisters and step mother.  
We triumph whether they are bound in hot iron shoes or whether they 
are just forced to call Cinderella 'You Highness'.  We don't wonder 
about the psychological reality of her happily ever after.

OOTP aims at being much more and therefore fails IMHO because you 
cannot retroactively make Harry's life with the Dursleys more painful 
than what we saw or make his trials with Voldemort more 
traumatizing.  Sure they were hard but he seemed fine after them once 
Mme Pomfrey patched him up. Even in GOF he seems to have dealt with 
his pain and is already raising himself up for battle like the good 
little soldier we know he is. The same boy who fought the basilisk 
and never thought about it again.

I laughed when he railed about his past.  All I could think is "Come 
on! You loved it!"  It was so discordent with the tone of the rest of 
the series.  IME Rowling thinks she can write Harry out of his past.  
I think she's kidding herself. She can't turn Cinderella into 
Christ.  It doesn't work that way.  A Cinderella tale is far too 
psychologically crude.  And she enver bothered to make it anything 
but that.  

I think we liked it that way.  HP's popularity may have been 
something of a modern day Punch and Judy show.  Part fun and farce 
with some modern family values and boy scout ethics mixed in.  
Something the old and young all agreed was a good time.

Golly