[the_old_crowd] Thoughts on HBP

[sean dwyer]

On Thu, Sep 02, 2004 at 07:39:21AM -0400, Steve Vander Ark wrote:
> As I write that, the possible connections to the story and to Rowling's own
> philosophy just tumble through my head. 
> 
> - the Sorting Hat pleading for unity
> - the emphasis on acceptance and understanding with Kreacher
> - the whole Fountain and it's twisted meaning
> - the fact that CS, of all the books, harkened back to the "time of legend,"
> the founding of Hogwarts

> - Arthurian overtones: Albus/Albion, the baby king hidden away to grow up in
> safety, etc
> And I could go on and on. Arthur is supposed to return some day to reunify
> Britain under his enlightened rule, isn't he?

> [Okay, I need someone to write an essay on the Arthurian connection to
> Potter. Any takers?]
> 
> Steve
> Looking eagerly for that essay

Tricky. What particular Arthurian connection are we looking for? There are so
_many_ to choose from! Much of what I've gleaned below was with the help of
Joseph Campbell's book, Creative Mythology which is as much concerned with the
Arthurian legends as with everything James Joyce wrote.

Do we go with the 'pre-ordained future' pagan tale of the guidance of young
Arthur (Harry) by Merlin (Dumbledore) towards the future of a One True King?
Avalon is a name for the Land of Youth; in Celtic myth it is an island of elf
women (the Lady of the Lake), to which Arthur is borne by mysterious women, to
be healed by the elven women and return in the future. To the Celts, this
would be more than the usual reincarnation, a mark of special favour. This
symbology was later repeated in the Tristan and Isolt romance, in which the
theme of the infant exile and return was also repeated. 

Or perhaps the symbology is of the Fisher King. This is even more enticing,
since he is thought to partly symbolize Orpheus/Neptune, who has the silver of
the fish, and his role is controller of the _tides of the moon_.  The moon is
in this context also a symbol of immortality (a cup forever emptied and
refilled). But more than that, there are TWO kings, the Maimed One and the Old
One, between which the Grail passes, much like the phases of the moon. In fact
the Maimed One's wound is most painful at the waning of the moon. So there is
also here the symbolism of the Wheel of Life, a cycle from which the Maimed
One cannot break without outside health.

Consider the basic problem of the Grail legend: A pure knight must find the
Castle of the Grail and ask a specific question which will relieve the Maimed
One and revitalize the land. He subsequently would become the Grail's keeper,
but if he asks the _wrong_ question, everything disappears and he has to start
searching all over again. So we have a cycle to be broken, and it's not just
anyone who can ask the question. It's like changing the cycle between life and
death. Tristan, too, has a wound that will not heal and its pain also waxes
and wanes.

Not to be omitted is the alchemical connection of the Escherbach version of
the Grail legend: the Philosopher's Stone. "By the power of that stone, the
phoenix burns and becomes ashes, but the ashes restore it speedily to life" he
says, and goes on to give the immortal properties of the Grail. It was also
known as dragon or serpent and perhaps vaguely egg-shaped (at least according
to Jung, who wrote screeds about the symbology of alchemy, and whose wife Emma
wrote an interesting book about the Grail legend which I'm still reading).

But to continue: Tristan was wounded by a lance (like Christ) and somehow this
romance got subsumed into later Arthurian legend as the particular wound that
the Maimed One has. Galahad turns up as either the grandson of the Maimed One
himself, or of the line of Joseph of Aramethea, or Sir Lancelot (the Malory
version), depending on who you believe, but at all accounts the Pure Knight.

According to Malory, Galahad is the one who draws the Sword from the
Stone, and also sits in a seat foretold for him on the feast of Pentecost,
after which the Grail appears under a veil to all, and Galahad vows to find
it. Things get a lot more fanciful from there on, with Galahad and Perceval
taken up into heaven and Sir Bors returns to tell the tale. 

But in the original Parzival, his brother Feirefiz could not see the Grail
until he had been baptized. Parzival heals the Maimed One by asking 'Uncle,
what ails thee?'

And for now I'll leave this investigation there. Hopefully that's given
someone a lead to go further than I.

-- 
Unix is very user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are.