HBP Review in Globe and Mail

[lorelei3dg]

No: HPFGUIDX 134914

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "shihtouji" 
<Noel.Chevalier at u...> wrote:
> I don't know if anyone else in Canada (or elsewhere!) read Andre 
> Alexis' review of HBP in Saturday's Globe and Mail Book section, 
but 
> some of what he says has been bothering me, and I'd like to hear 
the 
> list's reaction.  
>
> <snip>
>
> Some of this may have already been discussed--I haven't had time to 
> read all the posts--but Alexis spends a good part of his review 
> discussing DD's death, and how little it moved him, and how he 
> suspects that DD isn't dead at all--and hopes that he's right.  
> 
> Now, it's why he hopes he's right that bothers me.  It's not out of 
> any great love for DD--in fact, he seems to think that all of JKR's 
> adult characters are rather one dimensional.  He says, for 
example,  
> that "DD has never been much beyond a cardboard cut-out with the 
> word 'wise' written on it."  He goes on to note that DD's death 
> was "as suspicious as Gandalf's was in TFOTR"--and then suggests 
that 
> DD's death is "pivotal" to evaluating JKR's work.  Because, for 
> Alexis, "[i]f DD is dead, then the character has been (all along) 
> nothing more than a prop, not at all wise or clever, and his death 
a 
> rather cheap effort to elicit emotion.  On the other hand, if DD is 
> still alive, then he has finally acted in a way that confirms his 
> vaunted skill as a magician and his powers of imagination."
> 
> However, JKR has come down quite firmly about this vis a vis 
Sirius's 
> death (and James and Lilly's for that matter).  She says that once 
> you're dead, you're dead--no crossed fingers, &c.  For DD to "pull 
a 
> Gandalf" would seem to me to be a cheap parlour trick, and would 
> seriously lessen the entire Potter series in my eyes.  I'm willing 
to 
> accept, hard as it is, that DD is gone for good, and that Harry now 
> had to rely on his own instincts, rather than letting DD confirm 
his 
> actions (as he does a lot in HBP). 
> 
> <more snippage> 
>
> But does anyone else out there share Alexis' point of view?   
> 
> Cheers
> Noel.


Lorel responds:

I agree with you. I haven't read the entire review (and feel no 
burning need to do so), but from what you've explained here, it seems 
as though the author does not understand the themes of the series at 
all, and certainly can't be familiar with JKR's own comments on the 
subject of death in the books. Within the context that she has 
created, it seems as though DD's remaining alive would cheapen the 
story much more than his death, not least by toying with the emotions 
of readers (myself included) who have mourned DD's passing.