Unlocking the Hidden Pattern (was Part 2)

[davewitley]

No: HPFGUIDX 93326

Sienna wrote:

> In both books Harry heads down into a hidden area.  In CoS it's
> the 
> Chamber of Secrets. In OoTP, this is mirrored when he and his 
> friends head into the Department of Mysteries.  The relationship 
> between `secrets' and `mysteries' is obvious.  Both
> are underground 
> areas.

This is a very interesting group of posts, that requires 
considerable study.

Given that JKR is a churchgoer and has hinted at Christian influence 
on the story (IIRC), you might like to look at Chapter 1 of the 
Biblical book of Genesis, where the creation story is told in a 
similar 1,2,3;1,2,3;7 pattern.

However, I feel you have to do a little more to make your case.  The 
problem is, that these stories abound in parallels, and you have to 
show that they are more frequent, or more thematically appropriate, 
or more structurally embedded, in the pairs of books you have 
nominated.

For example, Ron is injured in books 1, 3 and 5; Polyjuice is used 
in 2 and 4; and so on.

In the case I have quoted above, you touch on something that has 
long intrigued me: that in *all* five books, there is a 
subterraneous element to the climax.  I agree, in COS it is 
clearest, the chamber is deep underground.  In PS, they drop through 
the trapdoor, and it is hard to be sure how far they go down, but 
the symbolism is there, to my mind.  In POA, they get to the Shack 
via an underground passage.  In GOF, the least clear case, Harry is 
transported from a maze to a graveyard (a place of burial), and 
there is a symbolic burial element to the story when Harry's blood 
is tossed beneath the surface of the cauldron.  And, as you say, in 
OOP, the Department of Mysteries is at the very bottom of the 
Ministry, which is itself mostly underground, as Arthur is at pains 
to point out.  All five episodes take place at night.

I'm not sure whether this is just JKR adopting a common narrative 
device, where the hero undergoes symbolic death before emerging 
victorious, or if there is more to it.  Her critics attribute this 
sort of thing to a lack of imagination, of course.

I think that, in general, JKR's use of repetition and parallels is a 
very under-explored area, even in a group such as this, and 
surprisingly so, given its obvious predictive application.  There is 
an excellent essay on the Lexicon 
( http://www.hp-lexicon.org/essays/essay-dada-teachers.html ) which 
looks at the Defence Against the Dark Arts professors (and points up 
what I thought obvious, that it is always a brand new character), 
but I can think of little else.

David