The Deathly Hallows

[shmeep]

For all you Potter fans out there:

‘Deathly Hallows’ await Harry & Co. in next tome
By Linda G. Kincaid
Friday, December 22, 2006 - Updated: 01:57 AM EST

Harry Potter fever burned hotter than a goblet of fire yesterday after author J.K. Rowling unveiled the title of the long-awaited seventh book in the wildly popular series.

“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” will be the final chapter in the tale of a boy wizard and his pals at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Online bookseller Amazon.com reported a surge of interest in Harry Potter yesterday after the title was announced.

Rowling revealed last June that two characters will die in Book 7, but she hasn’t said much more. The mysterious title - “deathly hallows” haven’t been featured in previous books - touched off a wave of online speculation.

“Hallows are places where spirits are known to dwell, so I wonder if we’re going to see Harry, Orpheus-like, going into the Underworld . . .” a fan posted at the popular fan site MuggleNet.com.

Other readers couldn’t see past the thrill of knowing something - anything - about the book.

“DID I JUST DIE?!” wrote another MuggleNet poster. “AM I IN HEAVEN?! I HOPE NOT OTHERWISE I WON’T BE ABLE TO READ THE BOOK!”

The title was revealed through a puzzle at www.jkrowling.com, where visitors have to guess the name of the book from the clues given.

Potter fans had been hoping that Book 7 would be published on July 7 next year (07/07/07 - get it?), but neither Rowling nor her publisher have committed to a publication date. With Rowling saying that she’s still writing, publication next summer seems unlikely.

In another post on her Web site, Rowling said she recently saw a “fantastic” 20-minute preview of the fifth Harry Potter film, “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix,” due to be released in July.

The Harry Potter books have sold more than 300 million copies and have been translated into 63 languages.

And here's an interesting little tidbit from mugglenet.com:

Some news outlets are reporting the title as "Deathly Hollows," but this is incorrect. Also, for those of you who hadn't noticed, the title was released yesterday on the winter solstice. Recall in OOTP: "...at the solstice will come a new... and none will come after..." At the winter solstice, a new title will be revealed, but as this is the last book, no more will be released.

[mlm828]

This is the cover art (front and back covers) for the U.S. edition:

[krissie]

Thank, mlm, for showing us the artwork. Very interesting! I would share my immediate reaction to it... but if I'm right about what it's showing...

Knowing that the US artwork has now been made public made me wonder whether the British version has, too. And it has. (I see 7th Book Harry has muscles on his forearms.)

If anyone wants to see the British version, here's the link to Amazon's page, which allows you to choose to see front, back and inside flaps of the book's dust cover.

Four months to go... and counting.

Krissie

[mlm828]

You read my mind. As you were posting, I was uploading the covers of the two UK editions:

Adult edition:


Children's edition:

[Eyphur]

is the wording of both the adult and children's versions the same? I didn't realized they published in different editions.

[krissie]

I'm pretty certain that the text is identical between the two versions. I think the idea of the adult versions was so that grown ups wouldn't feel embarrassed reading kiddies books on public transport!

Having said that, I don't know anyone who has the adult versions. And in all my adventures in house hunting, I've only ever seen children's versions on people's bookshelves. (And, hey, I looked at a lot of houses before moving into this one!)

Still... someone must buy them.

Krissie

[housemouse]

I just re-read Order of the Phoenix and Half Blood Prince. I am even more torn about Snape than I ever have been. I want to believe he is a good guy because Dumbledore trusted him, but I can't help thinking he is a bad guy!

He killed Dumbledore, so the question ends up being did he do it on Dumbledore's orders, or did he do it on Voldemort's orders. Everything points to Snape being a bad guy - but Dumbledore trusted him! Argh!

I still think Neville is going to die in the next book. I am thinking Luna might die as well and maybe McGonagal. I think that Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny will come out of it alive. Some other members of the Weasley family might die, but I bet Ron, Ginny, Fred and George will not. Maybe Percy will die, he is inline for a karmic ass-bite.

I cannot wait to read this book.

[Chris]

housemouse said:

I just re-read Order of the Phoenix and Half Blood Prince. I am even more torn about Snape than I ever have been. I want to believe he is a good guy because Dumbledore trusted him, but I can't help thinking he is a bad guy!

I never liked Snape yet all through the series I've had a feeling that he was one of the good guys - just not very likeable

housemouse said:

I still think Neville is going to die in the next book. I am thinking Luna might die as well and maybe McGonagal. I think that Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny will come out of it alive. Some other members of the Weasley family might die, but I bet Ron, Ginny, Fred and George will not. Maybe Percy will die, he is inline for a karmic ass-bite.

Karma for the "karmic ass-bite"
I think you may be right about McGonagal dying, but if Ron, Hermione or Ginny dies, that will be almost unbearable.
And surely Harry will survive, right? RIGHT???

housemouse said:

I cannot wait to read this book.

Me neither. I'm thinking of re-reading the whole series before the release of The Deathly Hollows since I ordered the English edition, I decided I couldn't wait till October for the Danish edition.
So I guess I'm off to the library on Monday

- Chris

[housemouse]

chris said:

guys - just not very likeable

Karma for the "karmic ass-bite"
I think you may be right about McGonagal dying, but if Ron, Hermione or Ginny dies, that will be almost unbearable.
And surely Harry will survive, right? RIGHT???

Rereading Half Blood Prince, I cried from the moment Snape killed Dumbledore through the end of the book. You are right, I don't know if I could handle losing Harry, Ron, Ginny or Hermione, that might just be too much.

[maggiethecat]

According to this from the Detroit Free Press, "Deathly Hallows" has been leaked onto the web and can be downloaded off an unnamed photobucket site (?). (Now, there's a download to freeze the average computer.) Apparently it's not text but amateur photos of the pages themselves, and not always legible.

Sheeesh, people, you can't wait until Saturday?

Spoilers of new 'Harry Potter' book hit the Web
July 17, 2007

By JULIE HINDS

FREE PRESS POP CULTURE WRITER

As reports fly of Harry Potter book leaks on the Web, fans are hoping the magic won’t be spoiled.

Photos of what appeared to be every page of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” the heavily-hyped seventh and final novel of the J.K. Rowling series, were circulating on the Web today.

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It wasn’t clear if they were legit or if they would affect the carefully laid marketing plans for the book’s debut on Saturday at 12:01 a.m.

But one thing is certain: Even a flurry of potential leaks won’t dampen the enthusiasm of Potter devotees.

Fans like Rachael Vail-Steele, 19, of Canton, want to discover what happens in the latest Harry Potter book the old-fashioned way, by actually reading the book.

Before the latest leak rumors surfaced, Vail-Steele shared her strategy for the
moment the book goes on sale.

“I plan to go into what’s called media blackout and avoid the Web,” she said.

She’s also asked for the day off from her job at a clothing store, so she won’t overhear anyone talking about the book.

“I want to find out for myself,” she said, referring to details like who lives and who dies in the final Potter novel.

But is it too late for that? Although the book’s release is being as scrupulously guarded as most state secrets, a huge potential leak surfaced Tuesday.

Various file-sharing sites were carrying what looked like amateur photographs of each pair of facing pages of the book. The pictures show the book laid out on a green and red-flecked looped carpet with somebody’s fingers holding it open.

Some of the pictures make the text difficult to read, but the ending is legible.
Kyle Good, a spokeswoman for Scholastic, the book’s American publisher, said she was aware of at least three different versions of the file “that look very convincing” with what she described as “conflicting content.”

Scholastic has been busy ordering would-be spoilers to remove their information from the Web.

Good said that “anyone can post anything on the Web and you can’t believe everything you see online.”

And this is just the pre-release controversy. Once “Deathly Hallows” is officially available, it will be hard to avoid the scoop on the ending unless you forego everything from television to conversations at work.

That’s the way it is in our heavily-hyped, media-saturated, wired world.

Spoilers are spoiling everything, some claim, or at least they’re ruining our ability to experience books, movies and TV shows the way they were meant to be.

Consider the finale for HBO’s “The Sopranos.” If you were among those who missed the episode or TiVo’d it for a later time, you woke up the next day to find news outlets describing the controversial ending and replaying the clip endlessly.

Spoilers have long been problematic for movies like “The Sixth Sense” and “The Crying Game,” where the dramatic tension hinges on a plot twist that viewers didn’t see coming.

It used to be possible to avoid spoilers by going to films on their opening week, or by skipping over paragraphs where reporters or critics inserted a “spoiler alert” warning.

Nowadays, spoilers appear frequently on the Web long before a movie or TV show debuts, and sites are devoted to compiling them.

Spoilers also have increasingly become a part of the mainstream marketing process. Movie trailers tend to give away all the good jokes from upcoming comedies. TV episodes conclude with detail-laden “scenes from the next episode.”

Still, fans can fight back, sometimes by turning off previews or even plugging their ears and humming.

With Harry Potter, a phenomenon as big and beloved as any in pop culture, the battle against spoilers is being waged openly.

Wal-Mart, for instance, has put up a Web pledge site, Makethepledge.net, where people can click to promise not to reveal the ending of “Deathly Hallows.”

At one of the leading Harry Potter Web sites, The-Leaky-Cauldron.org, there is a strict no-spoilers policy.

“We take active steps to try and catch the people who are doing the spoiling,” said Melissa Anelli, the site’s webmaster.

Last week, when the Leaky Cauldron received what seemed to be pages from the book, the site gave them to the publisher.

Anelli said she isn’t sure what drives those who want to spoil a literary surprise. “It’s really mean-spirited,” she said.

Some readers say finding out the ending unintentionally wouldn’t ruin the book for them.

“If someone tells me, I can deal with it,” says Colleen Kammer of Book Beat in Oak Park, which is holding a Harry Potter party Friday night. “For me, personally … the journey, that’s the pleasure of reading it.”

Kammer, however, hopes the surprises won’t be spoiled for the youngest Potter fans.

“Anybody who wrecks it for kids, that’s disturbing,” she said.

Mary Ellen Aria, whose Aria Booksellers in Howell is headquarters for a big party in Howell on Friday, said she fully expects to find out what happens in the book unexpectedly.

The last time a Potter book came out, a child ran into the store Saturday morning and blurted out the ending.

“We were all, like, ‘No, no, no!,” remembered Aria. “We were all so disappointed.”

Aria would prefer to read the details herself, and she’s still optimistic.

“I hope everyone will keep it quiet,” she said..

[Chris]

chris said:

housemouse said:

I just re-read Order of the Phoenix and Half Blood Prince. I am even more torn about Snape than I ever have been. I want to believe he is a good guy because Dumbledore trusted him, but I can't help thinking he is a bad guy!

I never liked Snape yet all through the series I've had a feeling that he was one of the good guys - just not very likeable

Reading the books I have a hard time finding Snape very likeable but seeing the movies I get a whole different opinion of him.
I just saw the Philosopher's Stone and The chamber of Secrets and tonight I went to see he Order of the Phoenix and Alan Rickman's Snape is mean and quite scary but he also has this little twinkle in his eye that tells me that maybe he is not that bad after all.....

- Chris

[maggiethecat]

MODIFIED TO ADD:

[glow=red,2,300]WARNING -- SEVERAL VAGUELY-WORDED *SPOILERS*[/glow]

Here's the review of Deathly Hallows from The New York Times -- really terrific and also nicely written.

An Epic Showdown as Harry Potter Is Initiated Into Adulthood

By MICHIKO KAKUTANI
Published: July 19, 2007

So, here it is at last: The final confrontation between Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, the Chosen One, the “symbol of hope” for both the Wizard and Muggle worlds, and Lord Voldemort, He Who Must Not Be Named, the nefarious leader of the Death Eaters and would-be ruler of all. Good versus Evil. Love versus Hate. The Seeker versus the Dark Lord.

J. K. Rowling’s monumental, spellbinding epic, 10 years in the making, is deeply rooted in traditional literature and Hollywood sagas — from the Greek myths to Dickens and Tolkien to “Star Wars.” And true to its roots, it ends not with modernist, “Soprano”-esque equivocation, but with good old-fashioned closure: a big-screen, heart-racing, bone-chilling confrontation and an epilogue that clearly lays out people’s fates. Getting to the finish line is not seamless — the last part of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” the seventh and final book in the series, has some lumpy passages of exposition and a couple of clunky detours — but the overall conclusion and its determination of the main characters’ story lines possess a convincing inevitability that make some of the prepublication speculation seem curiously blinkered in retrospect.

With each installment, the “Potter” series has grown increasingly dark, and this volume — a copy of which was purchased at a New York City store yesterday, though the book is embargoed for release until 12:01 a.m. on Saturday — is no exception. While Ms. Rowling’s astonishingly limber voice still moves effortlessly between Ron’s adolescent sarcasm and Harry’s growing solemnity, from youthful exuberance to more philosophical gravity, “Deathly Hallows” is, for the most part, a somber book that marks Harry’s final initiation into the complexities and sadnesses of adulthood.

From his first days at Hogwarts, the young, green-eyed boy bore the burden of his destiny as a leader, coping with the expectations and duties of his role, and in this volume he is clearly more Henry V than Prince Hal, more King Arthur than young Wart: high-spirited war games of Quidditch have given way to real war, and Harry often wishes he were not the de facto leader of the Resistance movement, shouldering terrifying responsibilities, but an ordinary teenage boy — free to romance Ginny Weasley and hang out with his friends.

Harry has already lost his parents, his godfather Sirius and his teacher Professor Dumbledore (all mentors he might have once received instruction from) and in this volume, the losses mount with unnerving speed: at least a half-dozen characters we have come to know die in these pages, and many others are wounded or tortured. Voldemort and his followers have infiltrated Hogwarts and the Ministry of Magic, creating havoc and terror in the Wizard and Muggle worlds alike, and the members of various populations — including elves, goblins and centaurs — are choosing sides.

No wonder then that Harry often seems overwhelmed with disillusionment and doubt in the final installment of this seven-volume bildungsroman. He continues to struggle to control his temper, and as he and Ron and Hermione search for the missing Horcruxes (secret magical objects in which Voldemort has stashed parts of his soul, objects that Harry must destroy if he hopes to kill the evil lord), he literally enters a dark wood, in which he must do battle not only with the Death Eaters, but also with the temptations of hubris and despair.

Harry’s weird psychic connection with Voldemort (symbolized by the lightning-bolt forehead scar he bears as a result of the Dark Lord’s attack on him as a baby) seems to have grown stronger too, giving him clues to Voldemort’s actions and whereabouts, even as it lures him ever closer to the dark side. One of the plot’s significant turning points concerns Harry’s decision on whether to continue looking for the Horcruxes — the mission assigned to him by the late Dumbledore — or to pursue the Hallows, three magical objects said to make their possessor the master of Death.

Harry’s journey will propel him forward to a final showdown with his arch enemy, and also send him backward into the past, to the house in Godric’s Hollow where his parents died, to learn about his family history and the equally mysterious history of Dumbledore’s family. At the same time, he will be forced to ponder the equation between fraternity and independence, free will and fate, and to come to terms with his own frailties and those of others. Indeed, ambiguities proliferate throughout “The Deathly Hallows”: we are made to see that kindly Dumbledore, sinister Severus Snape and perhaps even the awful Muggle cousin Dudley Dursley may be more complicated than they initially seem, that all of them, like Harry, have hidden aspects to their personalities, and that choice — more than talent or predisposition — matters most of all.

It is Ms. Rowling’s achievement in this series that she manages to make Harry both a familiar adolescent — coping with the banal frustrations of school and dating — and an epic hero, kin to everyone from the young King Arthur to Spider-Man and Luke Skywalker. This same magpie talent has enabled her to create a narrative that effortlessly mixes up allusions to Homer, Milton, Shakespeare and Kafka, with silly kid jokes about vomit-flavored candies, a narrative that fuses a plethora of genres (from the boarding-school novel to the detective story to the epic quest) into a story that could be Exhibit A in a Joseph Campbell survey of mythic archetypes.

In doing so, J. K. Rowling has created a world as fully detailed as L. Frank Baum’s Oz or J. R. R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, a world so minutely imagined in terms of its history and rituals and rules that it qualifies as an alternate universe, which may be one reason the “Potter” books have spawned such a passionate following and such fervent exegesis. With this volume, the reader realizes that small incidents and asides in earlier installments (hidden among a huge number of red herrings) create a breadcrumb trail of clues to the plot, that Ms. Rowling has fitted together the jigsaw-puzzle pieces of this long undertaking with Dickensian ingenuity and ardor. Objects and spells from earlier books — like the invisibility cloak, Polyjuice Potion, Dumbledore’s Pensieve and Sirius’s flying motorcycle — play important roles in this volume, and characters encountered before, like the house-elf Dobby and Mr. Ollivander the wandmaker, resurface, too.

The world of Harry Potter is a place where the mundane and the marvelous, the ordinary and the surreal coexist. It’s a place where cars can fly and owls can deliver the mail, a place where paintings talk and a mirror reflects people’s innermost desires. It’s also a place utterly recognizable to readers, a place where death and the catastrophes of daily life are inevitable, and people’s lives are defined by love and loss and hope — the same way they are in our own mortal world.

[inuvik]

Our paper had a review too. Very similar to this, probably same wire service story. One detail it said not in here: 6 people die, and many more injured.

[rducasey]

Waiting to hear from some of the Harry Potter followers. Were any of you in line at midnight? I don't know- I could not ever get into them. I did read the first one and part of the second before I gave up on him. Just not my cup of tea, I guess. But boy, the hype and the press, wow, it has been quite the story. And J K Rowling, I would like to have her bank account. Anything that turns kids on to reading is a good thing.

[Katryna]

rducasey said:

Waiting to hear from some of the Harry Potter followers. Were any of you in line at midnight? I don't know- I could not ever get into them. I did read the first one and part of the second before I gave up on him. Just not my cup of tea, I guess. But boy, the hype and the press, wow, it has been quite the story. And J K Rowling, I would like to have her bank account. Anything that turns kids on to reading is a good thing.

I wasn't in line at midnight, but just picked up my copy at Barnes & Noble, expecting a looooong line. But, no...walked right up to the counter and was out in just a few minutes. I also have not read them, but agree that anything that gets kids reading is fine. My copy, by the way, is for my step-granddaughter who has read them all. I do enjoy the movies, though, and am hoping to get to Phoenix next weekend.