The Political HP

[Barry Arrowsmith]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, "Mike & Susan Gray" <mikesusangray at ...> 
wrote:
>
> 
> Hm. I don't sense too much of the saddened patriot in Rowling - I have more
> the impression that she's (a) skeptical about all institutional power
> structures but (b) deeply convinced that we need to practice solidarity. And
> (b) necessitates said institutinal power structures *despite* (a). (Just as
> people like Voldemort necessitate war, even though she distrusts that too.)
> 
> In that sense I would see her more as an anarchist manqué than a
> libertarian. 
> 

Quite possibly.
Certainly the most easily remembered v. v. minor characters (the quick
snapshot and then disappear bods) tended to display anarchic mindsets
and individualistic eccentricities doubleplus.

Though the message may be that while solidarity is needed, it need not 
be expressed solely through formal structures, and that without the 
individual as corrective all may be lost.

Haven't heard or read it, but I gather that Jo has broadcast an expanded
epilogue. The Ministry has been revamped and is now new and exciting. 
Oh dear.

I wonder if this has anything to do with her friendship with Gordon 
Brown and the coincidence (surely!) of the real time publishing
history of a series that in part depicts the progressive corruption of 
government, matches almost exactly the 10 year Premiership of Blair?
A book of its time?

Kneasy