Book idea; Life After Hogwarts

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 181567

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "bdclark0423" <bdclark0423 at ...> wrote:
>
> > Dick says:
> >
> > I loved the first seven books, but I would like to know more about 
> > what happens to the principal characters after Hogwarts. I'm 
> > interested in Hermione, Ron and Harry,
> > but also in some of the secondary characters. For example, Luna 
> > Lovegood is "different," but vulnerable.
> > I don't want to see her hurt.
> >
> > Dick
> 
> 
> bdclark0423:
> If the epilogue doesn't say enough, everyone consumes over-
> sweetened, pure-sugar, whipped-cream topped desserts the rest of 
> their lives.  Harry provides the childhood he never had to his own 
> children and everyone still stays in touch with the people they 
> developed friendships during Hogwarts.  In other words, they all 
> lived happily ever after, end of story, The End.
> 
> I don't think JKR even wanted the series to last this long, and I'm 
> afraid she may have felt the pressure to complete the series before 
> she was ready.  Harry has grown up, he has faced real-life demons, 
> as well as, his own personal demons.  He has prevailed.  I say we 
> let them live, within our own minds in accordance to the world JKR 
> has created...if that doesn't work, buy the movies.  (by the way, I 
> think the actress who plays Luna is perfect!!!)

Geoff:
I disagree that, if the epilogue doesn't say enough, everyone consumes 
over-sweetened, pure-sugar, whipped-cream topped desserts the rest 
of their lives. 

Using your metaphor, there are a number of sharp tasting lemons which 
have been jammed into the cupboard; things unresolved or not resolved 
overtly and which have been blocked by the epilogue.

It's all very well saying that the friendships which developed at Hogwarts 
have continued but there was space for some rapprochments to be made 
- friendships or similar developing across the battlelines.

To take one instance, I  wanted to see a thawing of the relationship 
between Harry and Draco. Harry finally came to see that Snape was 
not the person which he had constructed in his mind and was presented 
with the truth of his support for Dumbledore and his feelings towards Lily 
which provided incontrovertible evidence that he supported the side of 
good. It was sad that Harry only realised this posthumously. 

But apparently Harry then failed to see the possiblities of a "truce" with 
Draco. He had seen Draco on the tower; Dumbledore had seen to that 
almost with his last breath. Harry saw his doubts, his misgivings. There 
was space for some movement after the fire in the Room of Requirement 
- and yet JKR shuts things down with a curt nod between them 19 years 
later. How disappointing. Was this nod an indicator that they had spoken 
with each other without sarcasm or hatred or anger? We can only 
speculate. It would seem that, if Draco had  been arrested after 
Voldemort's death, he had been released and had time to bring up
a son by 2017. Did Harry intervene? Did his vacillation on the tower 
come to light? This is just one set of questions which were not answered 
and left me with a sense of irritation over the epilogue which, frankly, 
I wish hadn't been committed to paper.

Would it have been better to have left hese things unsaid or was JKR 
frightened of an outbreak of "what-if"-ism over the ongoing lives of 
those who survived the battles?

I shall certainly let them live within my own mind - but not necessarily 
moving on into the epilogue world JKR has created.....