{"id":522,"date":"2007-07-16T18:26:50","date_gmt":"2007-07-16T18:26:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog-test\/?p=522"},"modified":"2024-02-11T20:28:02","modified_gmt":"2024-02-12T01:28:02","slug":"rowling_06","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/2007\/07\/rowling_06\/","title":{"rendered":"Rowling, J.K.: (06) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince<\/cite> (re-read)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the weekend, I finished my pre-book-7 re-read with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince<\/cite><\/strong>, or, as I found myself thinking of it, Harry Potter and the Belated Infodump<\/cite>. It looks a little worse on a re-read, now that I’m past the relief that it’s not another Order of the Phoenix<\/cite>, and I continue to have concerns about whether the conclusion will be satisfying.<\/p>\n

This principally stems from my feeling that the books are weakest when it comes to the mythic, and I can’t see how the ending can be other than mythic. Since the first book, there’s been a theme about the power of love, which could in theory work, but here, well, I can’t even write the phrase without rolling my eyes. There was no improvement on that front in this book—but I did find a small ray of hope in the direction taken with regard to fate and prophecy and predestination.<\/p>\n

Here I’m obligated to note that I’m still worried that the broad critiques of Wizarding society will get lost in the plot to come. The opening of this book was interesting in that regard, as the first return to an omniscient viewpoint since book one. (Yes, there’s the fourth book’s opening, but that gets fudged as a dream. (Rowling’s never been very concerned about strict POV limitations—consider the Pensieve scenes.)) Unfortunately, the return to school muffles the urgency in that wider view, a tension that’s been recurring throughout the series, and one of the reasons that I was really pleased by the ending of this book.<\/p>\n

(The opening of this book is also interesting for chapter 2, the wisdom of which seems likely to be debated hotly for years.)<\/p>\n

But this made me realize, on this re-read, just how much<\/em> plot is to come in the last book, even by the narrowest expectations. I’ve criticized prior books for dragging the plot out to fit the school year. This time I’m worried about the reverse, that there’ll be too much to fit easily and things will be slighted. (A book that’s nothing more than Harry Potter and the Quest for the Plot Tokens<\/cite> [*] will not satisfy.) Especially since this book shows signs of doing just that: there are a couple of matters that should have continued to be problems, but are very clumsily dropped—so clumsily, in fact, that I’m now more inclined to believe that some things have been set up from the start, because of the contrast. And I particularly worry about plot holes in quick-wrap-this-up situations.<\/p>\n

(One that I’m oddly afraid of is that Rowling can’t count. For very spoilery reasons why, see this old LJ post<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

Two other notes: the “Half-Blood Prince” subplot in this book still feels kind of forced, for all that I can infer a couple of reasons for it to be there. And everything adolescently-hormonal in this book is awful, and I say that as someone who was not bothered by the portrayal of Harry and Cho.<\/p>\n

On the whole, as I said two years ago, I am more excited about the series than I had been after this book and the possibilities its ending opens up. The re-read has helped me get a better handle on my hopes, expectations, and fears. While I don’t have it in me to get too emotionally invested after Stephen King ripped out my heart and stomped on it<\/a>, I am looking forward to the last book.<\/p>\n

[*] I find myself wanting to do parody titles for all the books, now, but nothing’s leaping to mind for the first three. The others are:<\/p>\n

\n

4. Harry Potter and the Idiot Plot<\/cite>
5. Harry Potter and the TEENAGE ANGST<\/cite>
6. Harry Potter and the Belated Infodump<\/cite>
7. Harry Potter and the Quest for the Plot Tokens<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Suggestions?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the weekend, I finished my pre-book-7 re-read with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, or, as I found myself thinking of it, Harry Potter and the Belated Infodump. It looks a little worse on a re-read, now that I’m past the relief that it’s not another Order of the Phoenix, and I continue to … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Rowling, J.K.: (06) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince<\/cite> (re-read)”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,83,15],"tags":[367],"class_list":["post-522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-harry-potter","category-sf-and-fantasy","tag-rowling-j-k"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=522"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2806,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522\/revisions\/2806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}