SHP#33 – The Lovegoods
While fighting colds and crashing computers, we bring you a new episode of the Secrets of Harry Potter, in which we explore chapter 20 of The Deathly Hallows: Xenophilius Lovegood. We also have lots of feedback from listeners and a new round of tough trivia!
Links:
- Potter Puppet Pals on YouTube
- Bob McWilliams’ blog
- Maria Johnson’s blog
- Jim Beeghley on Twitter
- Fr. Roderick’s Daily Breakfast, blog, Twitter, Facebook, Plurk
Post your comments below, or send us an email: harrypotter [ a t. ] sqpn.com
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Hey! it is not Microsoft that is bad! it is just vista! it is macs that are bad (at least when it comes to games). besides, When it comes to Amish, when they turn 18, they get to experience the rest of the world, including podcasts(apparently, the truly fateful can experience this and ignore the temptation). So please get your information right about other religions (No, i am not Amish)!
PS. i am first, yay!
Hi All, I’ve been listening since chapter one of the Deathly Hallows and it’s been great even though there have been some major long gaps in the schedule! I’m an Anglican in Brisbane, Australia BTW. I don’t have much to contribute except to say hi and thank you for sharing your passion for Harry Potter with the world and for doing so in such an open and accessible way.
Oh I just thought of a funny story: I was at a lecture and the lecturers computer wouldn’t plug into the projector so I lent him mine. When the screen came up in front of the class, I had iTunes open to the podcasts and the secrets of harry potter was very prominent. Having been outed as one of those childish people who can’t grow up but instead insist on reading silly children’s books, the lecturer announced that he was happy to be friends with any fan of Harry Potter.
While I’m thinking about it, here’s a link to a book that may be of interest for examining Christian symbolism is Harry Potter: How Harry Cast His Spell. I do have a small problem with this kind of book though: I don’t get the impression the J. K. Rowling has a particular Christian agenda which this author seems to suggest. I think she brought the symbolism of her faith to the books but I don’t think they are intentional allegories in the way that this author suggests.
I am the author of *How Harry Cast His Spell* and am rather disappointed that Matthew contends that I “suggest” the Harry Potter books are “intentional allegories” with a “Christian agenda.” That claim may have been made with some force about the books of which this one is the third revised and expanded edition (*Looking for God in Harry Potter*) post *Deathly Hallows* but misses the point entirely of this new book. I argue in it that the “meaning behind the mania” for Potter is human spirituality and longing for a victory over death, which desire Rowling satisfies imaginatively with a tale stuffed with Christian symbolism and content. This is not done with a particularly evangelical intention but because English literature’s traditions are Christian. My new chapters (about *Deathly Hallows*) describe at length that Harry is an Everyman figure rather than two-dimensional stand-in for Christ as others have argued and that they are the story of Ms. Rowling’s struggle for faith and choice to believe rather than a disguised altar call.
In my more recent book, more relevant to the subject of this post, *The Deathly Hallows Lectures: The Hogwarts Professor Explains Harry’s Last Adventure,* I detail the alchemical artistry and scaffolding of the series, the five keys that unlock *Deathly Hallows,* and the meaning of Harry and Dumbledore’s final words in the palatial King’s Cross. Rowling says that exchange is “the key” to her books that she waited 17 years to write. Its meaning is tied to the predominant eye symbolism of the last book, the epigraphs of the finale, and Harry’s walk into the forest, all of which are cued to the traditional symbolism of Harry, Ron, and Hermione, a body-mind-spirit triptych.
I invite SQPN readers to check out two other Harry geek web sites: my own http://www.HogwartsProfessor.com and Travis Prinzi’s http://www.theHogsHead.org. These sites, like SQPN, explore the layers beneath the surface meaning in keeping with the iconographic tradition of literary criticism a la John Ruskin.
Again, I do not argue in *How Harry Cast His Spell* that Ms. Rowling is humming “Onward, Christian Soldiers!” covertly through her books. She does address human spiritual concerns with the colors and symbols on the Christian palate of her tradition, sometimes “obviously” (as she admitted on the Open Book Tour), most often well beneath people’s radar. Thank you for letting me make this correction.
Since when do “Famous” authors listen to this podcast!?(lol)
In response to Nicholas F.’s comment–since Google alerts let you know when someone mentions your name or your book on their website.