This week, we finish up our Patterns in Potter discussion for Book 5, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. This time, we focus on Harry’s visions (courtesy of Lord Voldemort) and his driving urge to understand the truth of these visions, and what knowledge they can bring in aiding in the fight against evil. It’s quite an interesting discussion, and we end up talking about Gödel’s Theorem, for those of you who know what that is (for those of you who don’t, that’s why there is Wikipedia), and discuss rationalism, existenialism and religion.
Send us your thoughts, we look forward to hearing from you! You can leave comments here on the blog or send in your voicemails to 206-337-0357 in the US or 07092899490 in the UK. Please make sure to keep the message as close to one minute as possible and try to speak loudly and clearly.
No Moaning Myrtle in Half Blood Prince. The actress who plays her is busy checking out nursing homes (oh snap, that was mean. I know. I apologize to Shirley Henderson, but come on- she is old.)
There comes a time in a person’s life when they realize, for the first time, that the world is not actually the way they thought it was. That the picture they had in their mind about how the world works, the rules of the game, are suddenly gone. It is the end of innocence. When does this end of innocence occur for Harry, and for the series? In this week’s show, we discuss when Harry Potter first comes face to face with a picture of the wizarding world that is not what he thought he knew.
As mentioned before on HP Progs, JK Rowling came in 3rd for Time’s Person of the Year. Better luck next time you finish writing the world’s most popular book series that turned a generation back on to reading and inspired millions of people, Jo.
We are happy to announce that we will be attending Portus 2008, the Harry Potter symposium which will be held in Dallas, TX from July 10-13, 2008. We will also be taking part in the Portus Podcast Palooza while we are there. You may remember what a fantastic time we had at Prophecy 2007- we hope you can join us this year!!
The more interviews J.K. Rowling gives, the more show topics we get. This time, J.K. Rowling spoke with the Dutch newspaper Volksrant (not to be confused with Volkswagon or Voltron) and discussed many topics. Amongst them were the issues of life after death in the Harry Potter books, as well as more details on Nazi parallels and her religious background. In this week’s episode, we explore and plumb the depths opened by these recent comments.
UPDATE: We appreciate everyone’s patience with this week’s podcast. Unfortunately the podcast hosting service we were using was a bit messed up so the podcast wasn’t working- but we think it is fixed now. Please let us know if you have any more difficulty with it!
Last week we discussed love, and focused on the distinctly maternal focus taken by J.K. Rowling. This week, we examine the father figures in Harry’s life. From his actual, albeit ephermeral father James, to surrogates in Lupin, Sirius and even, to some extent Snape, we take a look at Harry’s bevy or male role models, how they shaped his character and how they contributed to his being what appears to be, for all that we can tell, a good father to his children as well.
There’s news this week, but we’re on the road, so we can’t provide links. Suffice it to say, Penny, at least, will be traveling to New York when Equus comes to town.
Although in English we have one basic term for love, there’s really all different kinds of love: brotherly love, selfless love, erotic love, and all make some kind of appearance in the Harry Potter novels. In this week’s show, we take a look at love in Harry Potter and how the various relationships are expressed, and what the nature of those loves might be. Are all loves good? Can love in fact be bad?
Plus: the Top 5 tear-jerker moments from Deathly Hallows. Vote for yours below.
Voldermort’s downfall was a long time coming. Despite his efforts to ensure his longevity, Voldemort’s overall approach to life almost guarunteed his defeat. By ignoring the signifcance of some very important “deeper magics,” Voldemort opened up a proverbial chink in his armor that ultimately led to his demise. In Chapter 35, King’s Cross, an etherieal Dumbledore sums it up nicely:
That which Voldemort does not value, he takes no trouble to comprehend. Of house elves and children’s tales, of love, loyalty and innoncence, Voldemort knows and understands nothing. NOTHING. That they all have a power beyond his own, a power beyond the reach of any magic, is a truth he has never grasped.
In this week’s episode, we take a deeper look at the general and specific causes of Voldemort’s downfall, paying particular attention to Dumbledore’s assessment.
There’s no question that there are religious/Christian undertones and themes to the Harry Potter books. In 2000, JK Rowling stated that if she were to divulge her religious beliefs, it would make the ending of the story obvious. Now that we’ve read Book 7, the religious content is clear; not only is Harry’s final battle with Voldemort very much a passion play, there are overarching religious themes to the entire book. What is the character of the religious content of Deathly Hallows in particular, and the Potter series in general? Is JK Rowling preaching or does she have a different intention? In this podcast, we explore the religious themes and try to figure out the religion of Harry Potter.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls, for in Book 7, it tolled for quite a few folks. The body count in the final book gets higher and higher as the book goes on. Some deaths, granted, were quite welcome, such as Bellatrix and Voldemort; others were tragic and shocking. All of them, however, held a special meaning for Harry and for the books. In this episode, we examine the specific meaning of that which gives ultimate meaning, the deaths of Deathly Hallows.
This episode is dedicated to the memory of Hedwig the Owl, Alastor “Mad-Eye” Moody, Dobby the Free Elf, Fred Weasley, Remus Lupin, Nymphadora Tonks, Colin Creevy and all those who gave their lives in the Battle of Hogwarts. And, of course, Severus Snape.
It’s been less than a week since the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, yet most of us have now read the book more than once; inevitably, bits and pieces need to be re-read to make sense of them. In addition to re-reading, the comments on our last post were extremely amazing, and really helped make sense of the book. This week, we look back through the comments and pull out a few topics to discuss further: a possible relationship between Harry and Voldemort? Examples of Voldemort’s spells not working, references to Nazis, the fittingness of Snape’s death. What was the purpose of the epilogue? And what did we need the Deathly Hallows for anyhow? Of course, there’s more questions that need to be discussed (who discovered magic later in life? Where did Harry’s parents get all that money from?), but they’ll have to wait until next time.
Thanks so much for all the great comments, keep them coming, we couldn’t do the show without them!
Make sure to listen to our interview on The James Madison Show from Friday, July 20. The interview can be found a the website if you click the podcast button. Special thanks to James and Frank for having us on.
Don’t forget to order your HPProgs t-shirts! Contact us if you’re interested in a red, white or black limited edition t-shirt.
This may very well be our last full episode before the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. In this episode, we discuss how we’re feeling (perhaps the five stages of loss would be appropriate), and take one final crack at a few theories before signing off and preparing for the weekend.
No news this week, but a few links of interest:
Get your HPProgs T-Shirts. You can order through the HPProgs Store, or email us (harrypotterprogs AT yahoo DOT com) to get a limited edition HPProgs red, white or black tee.
Catch us on the James Madison Show on Friday between 6 and 7 PM, it’s all about Potter, and you can call in!.
That’s it. Enjoy the show, towards the end we discuss our plans for the podcast after the release of the book(in short, we ain’t going no where as long as folks want to hear what we have to say).
What kind of a soul does a wizard have? JK Rowling has left many hints as to the nature of the soul, as portrayed in the Harry Potter books. In this week’s episode, we tie it all together in an attempt to figure out the true nature of the wizard’s soul.
So, we know that the big task facing Harry is to find and destroy Voldemort’s Horcuxes, thereby destroying the fragments of his tattered soul and shuffling off his mortal coil. Sounds simple, right? Not quite, there’s one problem that we haven’t addressed: Just how the heck does one destroy a horcrux anyhow?!?! Tune in for our best explanations as to how Harry will help Voldie meet his maker.
This week, we are joined by Andrew as our guest host. Andrew was the winner of our “So You Think Our Accents are Rubbish” contest. Thanks very much to Andrew for coming on the show and putting up with our technical difficulties!
News: Due to technical difficulties, we have an ad hoc version of the news this week. Which means no links. Ugh.
Also, we’ve recently upgraded the Wordpress installation for the site to version 2.1.3, which seems to be much more prone to crashing that the old version we were using, so hopefully we’ll get that straightened out soon.
Quite predictably, ever since we were introduced to The Prophecy in Book 5, it’s been the subject of controversy. Despite almost an entire chapter of Book 6 devoted to setting the record straight, questions still abound about what The Prophecy might mean. Could it be referring to Neville? (No.) Maybe it doesn’t have to come true? (No.) In this week’s podcast, we set the record straight.
A few old posts related to The Prophecy from the old HPProgs blog:
Since December 21, we’ve all had pretty much one question on our mind: what is the meaning of “Deathly Hallows?” We recorded some of our initial thoughts last time, and followed up with two blog posts with a more fleshed out theory: that the “Deathly Hallows” is the name for the magic that Lily used to protect Harry from Lord Voldemort by dying for him out of love. In this podcast, we go into greater detail on our theory and discuss how all the pieces fit together, incorporating many loosed ends, including horcruxes, occlumency, legilimens and that gleam in Dumbledore’s eye at the end of Book 4. It’s our theory, and we’re sticking to it!
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