lit. crit. and Potter

[Sean Dwyer]

Thankyou Carolyn for those interesting threads, some very thought-provoking
ideas.

<agd croak>
Mmm, in the time I've been on these lists, it surprises me how little standard
criticism there is!
</agd croak>

By "standard", I mean of the sort that Porphyria employed. I recognise there
was always a matter of culture shock (surprisingly little to this older
Australian perhaps), and a lot of deliberate archaism to be sorted out, and so
in some respects that these questions were asked early (Carolyn's msgs run
from Jan-Jul 2002) is no surprise, but they are not more developed is just as
interesting.

Naturally we are fans, and prefer to immerse ourselves in the Stimmung
(excellent word!) JKR has dreamed up for us, and seem to prefer questioning
the internal logic of characters. But insofar as we are trying to see where
JKR may be going, the external logic of the story must be also examined, and
we should not shy from that. 

Are the Lit. Crit. establishment merely waiting to pounce on post-Potter work
while avoiding serious examination of the Opus?  I do wonder - there's a lot
of pseudo-crit about, but the standard of Richard Adams is lacking. Or, as I
suspect, are they Tolkienizing Potter, deeming JKR to be another collector of
olde childish things, of the sort that amuse the fickle Publick? Does Potter
need defending like that, if at all?

Archaism is a good starting point, because it references many other notable
aspects of WW society. The Point to it (a few Points actually), is that the WW
is an alternate non-scientific society. As if medieval metaphysics and alchemy
had survived relatively unscathed (more oddly, essentially unchanged) because
magic had been found to be the way forward, except here we have a bifurcation
with one side of Western culture staying underground with the secret societies
and mystery cults of the 17th century, and the other towards the brave new
world we now inhabit. JKR is saying such a society wouldn't change all that
much, but it is obviously under enough external pressure to now be cracking.
The Harry-Voldemort conflict, while polarizing the WW, is still an archaic
struggle. The class war, exemplified by Dobby and not a few other disgruntled
magical creatures, is clearly not. Dobby and his leading SPEW advocate,
Hermione, are meant to put us in mind of modern labour struggles, and Fudge is
a quintessential Chamberlain. To standard criticism, it might seem obviously a
bizarre mix of medievalism and postmodern culture filching; on the other hand,
you could ask why, for instance, is British Royalty so fascinating to
Americans? Why do Australians like myself instinctively latch on to the class
assumptions inherent in the WW? In other words, the Old World is still with
us, we've only just painted the New World over it. 200-old years of
industrialism hasn't quite stamped out the assumptions of feudalism yet.

The WW problem, seen from a Muggle viewpoint, is that magic is a Bad Idea, a
dangerous Power that must be contained else an evil one will wield it, like
nuclear capability. Such an evil one has appeared, but we aren't given the
response of the Muggle PM, although we can probably guess it ("fix it or we'll
fix YOU").  Integration of the WW internally and externally with the Muggle
world is seen from the WW side as an unscalable cliff face, but the impending
alternative is cultural implosion. A divided WW may be just the thing for an
ambitious Muggle PM.  These conflicts are merely implied by the Opus, JKR
doesn't even begin to hint whether they even merit resolution; perhaps she
will allow the H-V denoument to suggest the WW may be facing up to such an
integration. 

Are there integral religious aspects to the WW? Certainly we're meant to
examine redemption, sacrifice, and not a little situational ethics (which
somehow philosophy hasn't quite wrested from religions grasp). I think it's a
bit glib though to paint Harry as a Christ-figure, however superficially
persuasive. Religious certainties would have to pale in the face of a Snape,
to say nothing of the self-contradictory Harry. To the standard lit. critter,
Voldemort is altogether too remote a figure. With a bwaha here and a bwaha
there, and a 'nurture gone wrong' backstory, he comes perilously at times to
panto. Beelzebub he ain't, although he tries hard. So perhaps we are meant to
look more closely at the conflicted middle rather than the certain extremes.
But when we step back from the characters, we're still left with that
Manichean duality of the bright swords vs. the green fire. (Why green? Why
couldn't the AK be red? Spoils the symbology, what?). Normal lit. crit.
projection defence mechanisms come into play here by deeming the whole thing
'confused'.

Back to the class war: how we react to it is the interesting thing. In real
life, we still pretend class is a thing of the past, when of course it isn't
and pervasively so. You don't need a belief in massive social conspiracies to
see that. Apply it to the WW and we are confronted with the same bemusement of
Ron, the same quiet rage of Hermione, the careless glee of Dobby and the
despairing shame of Winky. What answer do we give her? Interesting that Harry
refrains from entering that debate. It is one of the cleverest parts of Potter
that JKR gave us an alternate society to mirror our own concerns. She paints
the Muggle world as a endless dreary Suburb, of people so concerned to be
Equal they are nothing much at all. The WW is ultimate from-birth-to-grave
inequality, impossible to be otherwise, yet under sure strain of the outlook
of the New Witch and Wizard. Are we meant to think it's too easy to make a
grey blob of society while assured we are free from the old-world order?
Politics naturally comes into such discussions but I think real-world events
are beginning to teach us how much of a cultural phenonemon politics are.
Because it is not such a stretch to see Hermionie as a cultural imperialist.
Or Ron as an unconscious feudalist.

Is this the stuff that book 6 will hopefully either dispense with or finally
address, or does JKR even need to?

Sean

-- 
"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."