Storytelling in Harry Potter (2 of 2) (long)

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 170845

> >>Ann:
> I thought I'd leave a few days' gap between parts 1 and 2 in case
> anyone wanted to argue with part 1. But nobody seems to want to.    
> Part 1 of this is message number 170719. You probably don't have to 
> read it first, but in it I defined what I believe a plot to be and 
> argued that none of the books so far has had a plot.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
I read and admired your first post, Ann.  It actually brought to mind 
Mike Smith's readings of various Potter books      
http://mike-smith.livejournal.com/ (poke around and you'll find them) 
and his common end of chapter lament that nothing has happened.  
Seeing some of the books laid out chapter by chapter it really does 
become apparent that, yeah, nothing much happened in that chapter 
there.  It's all about the ending.  (I remember a blog group that 
read HBP for the first time, chapter by chapter, and I think most of 
them, though major Harry Potter fans, were dissappointed.)

But yes, I agree that Harry is a remarkably passive hero.  Very much 
like a pinball in a pinball machine.  Which is strange because he's 
last in line of a rather reactionary group.  We've got the Founders 
who take the action of founding a school away from Muggle eyes 
(foreshadowing the great seperation to come).  They get in a great 
fight of some sort, and the actions of that fight leave a pall over 
their school that lasts to Harry's time.

We've got the very active Tom Riddle, who does all sorts of flitting 
about, gathering information, hatching plans, putting them into 
action.  Dumbledore is oddly passive when it comes to Voldemort, but 
we've got hints of him acting somewhere else (taking down that other 
dark lord, Grindelwald).  And obviously the machinations of those two 
are pretty much what directs Harry from the moment of his birth.

The Marauders and Snape end up tangled in Dumbledore's and 
Voldemort's strings as well, but even they make some choices and take 
different actions on a level above (IMO) those of the Trio.  Even 
within the realm of school-days, the Marauders and Snape get up to 
far more than the Trio ever do.

It's strange, I think, that the Trio are so much blander than the 
ones who came before them.  (I'll even throw Draco in the mix here.  
I love the guy, but if he really wanted to take down Harry, I'm sure 
there's more he could have done.  Snape would have done more back in 
the day, I think.)

> >>Ann: 
> Although each book has a self-contained storyline, the series can   
> also be seen as one novel with a single Harry vs. Voldemort plotline
> (arguably excluding CoS) and minor plotlines concerning, for       
> instance, shipping and the Wizarding World's politics.
> <snip>
> I call this mega-plotline the "overplot", and the books look rather 
> different when analysed as a group rather than discrete works. The 
> plotlines that run from one book to another, such as shipping or    
> Harry's entering the Wizarding World, mean much more when the books 
> are read as one – Ron and Hermione's arguing in PoA being a
> prime example.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
I love this way of looking at it.  It makes so much sense to me.  And 
it's interesting, because I'm rather looking forward to a sort of 
subversive take on the story coming out in the future.  The story 
from Zach Smith's view point, for example.  And really, it would take 
only one book to do so, in the end.

IIRC, at one point in his read through, Mike Smith mentions that he'd 
have hated to been read the books as a bedtime story as an eleven 
year old, because there are so many chapters where nothing really 
happens.  The plot doesn't move at all.  It made sense to me, because 
I tend to read the books in chunks.  If a chapter is meandering, I 
plow right through it and get to the good stuff (the ending, for the 
most part).

Though, you've mentioned that you're not seeing this as a negative.  
And I'm not sure I'd label it a negative either.  (Though obviously, 
I'm referencing someone who *does* see this style of story-telling as 
negative.)  I guess it's like JKR is building up this layer-cake 
she's going to smash through with her plot catapult (love that 
phrase, by the way) in the end.  And her readers recognize that and 
look forward to the smash up enough that each added layer is 
something to enjoy. 

> >>Ann:
> DH will be the climax of the series, but to sustain an entire
> novel's worth of action, it'll need a plot, not just construction. 
> You may think she should have ditched Hogwarts' restrictive        
> environment a book back or more. But she's got plenty of experience 
> writing to those specifications, and she's writing the climax in a 
> new and very different style. DH is, in short, unguessable, and it 
> may be wonderful or something of a disappointment, new and exciting 
> or a failed experiment. The only thing we can really be certain    
> about is that the Horcrux hunt will be the most important narrative 
> strand (though Harry may disagree, and spend much of the book       
> looking for Snape.) The book might degenerate into a plot coupon    
> quest:
> http://www.ansible.co.uk/Ansible/plotdev.html
> or might be amazing, even despite that. We just don't know. This may
> sound overly pessimistic, but I'm a natural pessimist, and I'm not
> going to let my dark suspicions spoil DH for me. I can't wait to see
> what happens.

Betsy Hp:
Personally, I'm kind of glad that JKR's set up a structure for 
herself with the horcrux hunt.  As you've pointed out in your 
previous post, she's not much of a plot builder at least in an 
organic way.  But if she's got a structure to hang some of her 
character things on, she can concentrate on those bits.  And since I 
think it's her characters that are her greatest strength I feel 
better about DH turning out well if there are plenty of character 
concentrated scenes.

> >>Ann:
> <snip>
> I think DH will be a fantasy novel above other genres, just as the 
> early books were childrens' adventures above all. This abrupt      
> change of genre is another massive difference I'm expecting between 
> DH and the preceding six books.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
I strongly suspect (based on stuff others, like Sydney, have said 
over the years <g>) that DH is going to end with Harry healing the 
wounds of Hogwarts, and possibly the WW.  (Though I imagine that a 
healed Hogwarts will actually *mean* a healed WW.)  And while that 
can occur within a fantasy genre, I almost wonder if JKR won't steer 
more towards a family tale?  Which may well harken back to the family 
epic thing you mentioned regarding PoA in the part I snipped.  Just 
because JKR seems to have little interest in the fantasy genre 
herself, and since the Potter books, despite the magic, don't really 
seem to go for the fantasy thing either.  At least, IMO.

Great couple of posts, Ann!  I enjoyed them. 

Betsy Hp