HP Birthday & the Hallowe'en theme

[macfotuk at yahoo.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 109080

This is my first post and although I have tried to read through 
recent posts to get a 'gist' of topics (there are FAR too many!) and 
what may have been discussed so far (as well as searched this 
subject in the archive) I wanted to know what people have said about 
Harry's birthday and its significance if any. S'cuse me if my 
ideas/thoughts are 'old hat' or sound plagiarised (they genuinely 
are not intended to be).

JKR specified on her website the exact day of Harry's birthday, 
namely July 31st (at least on July 31st the 'wizard of the month' 
calender was labelled HP's birthday)- she may well have said this in 
one or more books too.

This means that Harry would have been exactly fifteen months old on 
the night he became 'the boy who lived' - namely Hallowe'en. JKR has 
always stated that the most significant aspects of the entire 7-book 
story are known, start to finish. It may simply be that for LV to 
attempt killing the 'one' who will be his eventual comeuppance (I 
don't think there's doubt on this, even if HP doesn't himself 
survive the encounter) on hallowe'en of all nights was for 
dramatic/literary impact alone, or else hallowe'en is the night a 
dark wizard's power would be strongest (was Lily killed at midnight?)
or hallowe'en might be the only night such a threat might be 
vanquishable, but I suspect there may be more in this that is 
revealed by the end of the series.

Most interestingly though, IMO, is that Harry would also (assuming 
wizards have standardly human gestation periods of 9 months) have 
been conceived on Hallowe'en and I'm not aware of anyone having made 
anything of this. This could perhaps be especially portentous of a 
powerful wizard and/or that specially strong magic might have been 
associated with his conception. the same might be true of neville 
(Longbottom) who was born around the same time - I am not aware of 
his exact birth date being known since he would have his birthday in 
the summer vac away from Hogwart's. In all the HP books something 
very significant occurs on Hallowe'en and I do not believe this is 
simply because Hallowe'en has obvious witch/wizard significance.

"macfotuk"