|
Post by hoosier on Jul 21, 2007 16:16:07 GMT -5
Thank heavens the day has finally arrived! The library where I work had to sign papers saying under no circumstances was the book to be put on the shelf or even discussed. I was surprised to hear that Scholastic was filing suit against a couple of places that put them out early (Bookstores that is) considering we had to sign paperwork surely all the stores had to also. Our copies have been here for a week with lists of people waiting plus two for prizes at the two Harry Potter parties the library is sponsoring. They are gone, the people having picked them up this morning. Whew! Maybe we can get back to normal!
|
|
|
Post by bjobsessed on Jul 21, 2007 19:10:12 GMT -5
Wasn't sure where to put this since it is both Harry Potter and Blindness but decided to put it here. These people are printing 1500 copies of The Deathly Hallows so blind people can read it too. (At a loss and the old fashioned way) www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19718438/Scroll down a bit and click on the Video Harry Potter link--making a difference
|
|
|
Post by shmeep on Jul 21, 2007 22:10:00 GMT -5
Yes, I waited in line at midnight. We even went to a crowded place filled with freaks enthusiasts and waited until 1:30am for our copies. We figured we could have gone someplace quiet and closer to home and waited for fifteen minutes, but this was the last one and we wanted it to be more of an event. There were news crews and thousands of people so it did feel like an event.
The most disturbing thing we saw was a man who was in costume, but really looked like he just wanted an excuse to go out in public in drag. It finally dawned on me that he was trying to be Hermione, but he just looked like a fifty-year-old man in a bad wig and lipstick wearing a skirt and school-girl shoes. And he was alone. Very creepy.
I finished the book at 10:30 this evening. Last night I read until 4:00am and then did nothing else all day. I stopped to eat a couple of times and I had a brief nap, but the entire day was dedicated to the book. I finally finished a Potter book ahead of my husband, but he showered and dressed and went out to get some lunch. I...didn't.
I won't give any spoilers until more of you have read it...and it may need to be in a different thread, don't you think? Or here, as long as everyone knows there will be spoilers. Let's just say that I was right about many of my theories, but it was still surprising and satisfying to see how they all played out. I'm dying to know what some of you think.
|
|
|
Post by mlm828 on Jul 22, 2007 1:08:24 GMT -5
I've finished it, too. It was quite a ride!
I won't say any more, for now. I agree with starting a separate thread for discussions, so people who haven't read the book yet can avoid it, if they so choose.
|
|
|
Post by Chris on Jul 22, 2007 4:47:02 GMT -5
I'm done too!!! I didn't wait in line at midnight but bought it Saturday morning. I began reading at about 2 PM and kept reading for twelve hours. I did take a break to make dinner and do the dishes but otherwise I was in "Potterland" I had planned to read the whole book before going to bed but with about a hundred pages left, I couldn't concentrate anymore and had to go to bed. Just finished off the last pages and am now ready to enter the Muggle World again ;D Take care and keep smiling - Chris
|
|
|
Post by Chris on Jul 22, 2007 5:00:06 GMT -5
Wasn't sure where to put this since it is both Harry Potter and Blindness but decided to put it here. These people are printing 1500 copies of The Deathly Hallows so blind people can read it too. (At a loss and the old fashioned way) www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19718438/Scroll down a bit and click on the Video Harry Potter link--making a difference Neat Loved the kid who said he would begin reading on Saturday and finish it in September LOL!!! - Chris
|
|
|
Post by krissie on Jul 22, 2007 7:24:37 GMT -5
Was it just me, or did other people deliberately keep their diaries clear this weekend, so that they could be left in peace to read? Bless Amazon and the postal service! My copy got delivered to the house yesterday morning. Spent most of yesterday reading (stopping for food, to rest my increasingly weary eyes, a few essential chores and a brief spurt of BJ on television by way of light relief). Finished reading this morning. Yes, some of my theories proved to be right, but some of my guesses proved to be wildly off the mark. I'm not sure that I would have binge-read to quite this extent were it not for the fact that I really didn't want to be 'spoiled'. Although I tried my best to avoid hearing anything about HP5 and HP6, in both cases I found out things I really didn't want to know before reading. Having said that, I binge-read both of those, too. Now that's over, perhaps I can get back to reading the Bernard Cornwell book I started a few weeks ago. Krissie
|
|
|
Post by maggiethecat on Jul 22, 2007 18:17:29 GMT -5
I like the idea of a Deathly Hallows *spoilers* thread, very much.
Bravo to all of you who spent the weekend reading! Since I'm not actually buying the book -- my bookshelves are so jammed that bringing in another book, especially a thick one, would mean throwing something away -- I put in a reserve at the library. If my calculations are right, I should be getting my copy sometime around Christmas . . . 2015.
So just tell me Harry doesn't die -- I can handle everything else!!!
|
|
|
Post by Eyphur on Jul 22, 2007 19:35:55 GMT -5
I bought a copy yesterday too. not for me tho, for my mom's birthday present. I did however, take a peak at the end.
|
|
|
Post by housemouse on Jul 22, 2007 21:54:40 GMT -5
I FINISHED!!! We need a thread to start talking about it.
|
|
|
Post by inuvik on Dec 13, 2007 13:29:55 GMT -5
I just read an interesting article about authors and their characters in Booklist, using the "Dumbledore is Gay" issue as an example.
The author, Bill Ott, argues that JK Rowling has no right to say that Dumbledore is gay. It's a long article, but I will just put in a couple of paragraphs (due to copyright!)
That's not to say, however, that Rowling shouldn't be perfectly free to comment on what she imagines Neville's life after the books to be, or what Dumbledore's life might have been like before the books began. But it's only that--her imaginings--because she chose not to explore those topics in any detail in the only world open to her characters, the world of the books. On the other hand, anyone--Rowling, you, or me--is free to offer interpretations of those lives based on what we know from the books. That's called literary criticism, and it's open to all. Arguing the thesis that Dumbledore is gay based on what we know of his character and his relationship with Grindewald is a perfectly legitimate essay topic, and if written by a talented author--with a somewhat broader focus than simply pinpointing one fictional character's sexuality--it could be quite fascinating. Look what Leslie Fiedler did in his classic essay "C'mon Back to the Raft, Huck Honey," about the homoerotic element in Huckleberry Finn.
But the main point here isn't whether Dumbledore is gay; it's that J. K. Rowling doesn't have the authority to say he is just because he's her character. Twain, no doubt, wouldn't have agreed with Fiedler, but that doesn't make Fiedler wrong--anymore than it makes Rowling right when she offers an interpretation of her characters' lives outside the books in which she wrote about them. Fiedler, at least, tried to make his case; Rowling just broke the news. If Rowling thinks Dumbledore's sexuality is an idea worth exploring, she might consider writing a love story starring Dumbledore and Grindewald as young men. That could make a fine book, and she wouldn't be the first writer to do a prequel.
Source Citation:Ott, Bill. "Inadmissible evidence.(The Back Page)(Essay)." Booklist 104.6 (Nov 15, 2007): 72(1).
I basically agree, and if anyone can get a hold of Booklist (Hoosier maybe), you can read more. I never really thought about the relationship between authors and their characters until reading this.
Maggie, do you have any thoughts on the rights of authors and their characters? I now think this is a really interesting topic!
|
|
|
Post by maggiethecat on Dec 14, 2007 17:32:03 GMT -5
J. K. Rowling doesn't have the right to say what she wants about her characters? Get a grip here! Dumbledore isn't REAL -- he's a fictional character and it's not like we're in the legal territory of libel here. J. K. Rowling invented the character, she made him up, he was and is hers to do with as she pleases. This is a non-argument. I just wonder if there'd been as much flack -- or even interest -- if J. K. had said that Dumbledore was a Liberal Democrat or liked kitties instead of saying that he was gay. A few years back I went to a terrific author signing with a number of mystery authors, among them Robert B. Parker, author of the terrific, long-running Spenser series. He's as gruff and blunt and funny as Spenser, too. A gushing woman stood up and asked him some ridiculous convoluted question about the relationship between Spenser and Hawk and blah, blah, blah. He -- nicely but firmly -- replied thusly: "He's not real. I made him up. I can make him do what I feel like making him do. End of story." ;D
|
|
|
Post by inuvik on Dec 14, 2007 17:47:16 GMT -5
J. K. Rowling doesn't have the right to say what she wants about her characters? Get a grip here! Dumbledore isn't REAL -- he's a fictional character and it's not like we're in the legal territory of libel here. J. K. Rowling invented the character, she made him up, he was and is hers to do with as she pleases. I think what Ott is getting at is: for how long after a book is written can authors keep coming out with "revelations" about their characters? If there is nothing, or very little, in the text to support something, should we just agree with what the author says? It's too bad this is such a recent example (and one that caused controversy). Let's talk about BJ as an example (not a book I know, but bear with me here). What if one of the writers, or producers, said in an interview now that Galloway was once a dope dealer and spent time in jail as a young man? We have nothing in the series that might support it. Are they free to do that? I think it's an interesting question.
|
|
|
Post by Dreamfire on Dec 14, 2007 18:30:41 GMT -5
It's just a blown up out of nothing issue. I find it amazing anyone even questions the author's right to reveal things about her character. And readers can listen or not, really. People are allowed to say whatever they want. ( US Constitution???) People are allowed to agree with, accept, reject, deny or argue against what they want. Most importantly People are capable of thinking whatever they like. ;D Thank goodness. So I have no issue with Rowling saying Dumbledore is gay, or even Harry is gay (Oh wouldn't there be an uproar over that!) Or that Hermoine is a canibal etc. I guess by NOT putting it in her books she stands a better chance of getting on, and staying on, bestseller lists and having her story accepted and showing a world that is more acceptable to more people. For the success she has had, perhaps she needs a Dumbledore who is sufficiently discreet that grandparents feel ok buying the book for their little ones, where those who do not accept gays will still allow their chidlren to read the book. Many people would have discouraged their kids from getting into it if Dumbledore had come out of the closet earlier. So perhaps she is an astute business woman? Having said it is a nothing issue, it is also quite interesting. I know when discussing story ideas with Anita I often refer to the charcters in BJ as our ( meaning everyone who reads BJ fic) barbie or BJ dolls. And it's hard to remove an image of Barbie say, riding a pink elephant, after you've popped one into a readers head. And this tempers my writing because I know people are attached to the picture we have in our heads of our fav characters. If someone wrote a story in which Jim was horribly disfigured or where he "Did a Dumbledore" I think it would cause me and other readers to feel some unpleasant emotions. The authors have the right, absolutely. The authors have a less absolute responsibility to recognise that the characters they write become much loved concepts in peoples heads and can cause emotional affects on the audience they have created. Dumbledore can be gay as far as I am concerned, I'm neither an avid reader nor anti-gay, and if she always saw him that way but kept it out of her book for sales reasons, I have no problem. I just hope she is concsious of the huge number of people she affects when she does bring him out of the closet. So, are the authors/producers of BJ allowed to say Galloway was once a dope dealer? Yes 100% yes. And they have to live with the consequences of their actions. If the series were running perhaps theywould lose some anti-dope viewers and gains some gang leaders. Anyhow, Psychiatrists are leaglised dope dealers, Innie. The producers can say Tunney is currenly cross dressing after he goes home from 1PP, Fisk is a Champion archer in his off hours, Christie has a second job as a waitress in a box car cafe, Leaonard Mattis has become a priest and Jimmy... well, they better keep their hands off Jimmy. Unless it is to revive his character in a full length movie
|
|
|
Post by shmeep on Dec 14, 2007 22:46:26 GMT -5
This is a very interesting discussion. I can understand people who feel that she's just sticking in random facts that were never explored in the books and they feel it's...annoying? I get why it annoys people, but she obviously has every right to do so. This author, more than any author I've ever heard of, has a backstory on every single character and she has had things in mind about all of them since the beginning so if she says she always knew Dumbledore was gay, I believe her.
Back when I was at a desk everyday and had endless time to wander around online, I used to check JKR's website regularly. There's a section there containing several facts she knows about various characters that never made it into the books. One is that Dean Thomas, who has always believed himself to be muggle born, actually had a Wizard father, but he never knew his father, his mother didn't know he was a wizard, and he was killed by Voldemort. Also, when it's mentioned in the books that the Prewetts were killed by Voldemort, what's not said is that they were Molly Weasley's brothers. See? Even the smallest details were thought out years in advance by JKR and many of them just couldn't fit in the books. I'm sure the gay thing was just like any of those and I love hearing about them in retrospect.
I like the idea I've heard rumored for a while about JKR writing a Harry Potter encyclopedia filled with facts about each character along with their unknown backstory and tidbits about what became of them all. She also plans to include general information that is relevant to her stories about magic and things people may not pick up on by casually reading the books. I would buy it and study it.
|
|