by Johnny
J.K. Rowling’s reference to “the Pardoner’s Tale” as the realworld myth or faerie tale basis for the articles known as the Deathly Hallows is interesting because of the obvious Christian references in Chaucer’s work, The Canterbury Tales. If the Pardoner’s Tale is a morality tale then the idea of JKR tapping into Chaucer implies [...]

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by Dave
Sorry for the wide ranging post, this time. But I’ve left the trail of this one intact in the way I worked through it from start to the point I’ve stopped. I have to confess, one of my favorite pieces of the Harry Potter universe is the giant squid living in the [...]

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by Travis
I’ve added a link to the side bar: Store of Gryffindor. As I work through books on the HP series and recommend them to you, I thought I’d create a place where you can order them, if you wish. Right now, the store consists of the novels themselves and some academic HP [...]

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by Dave
I’m glad to by a part of SoG, and I was honored Travis would ask me to be even one of the folks he entrusted his digital baby to. To get things rolling, I thought I’d start with something pretty straightforward.
The ferocity and tenacity of the two following points strike me about Harry Potter, [...]

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by Matthew
Hello and welcome to all.
Due to his expanded authorial duties (congratulations Travis!) Travis has asked me to become a moderator of Sword of Gryffindor. What an honour!
I will be trying to maintain the high standards and tone that Travis has established here. So, hopefully, you will not even realise that there has [...]

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A few weeks ago, just after Prophecy 2007, I sent 40+ pages of my work to Zossima Press, and they have agreed to publish a book! More details will follow in the coming months, and the book should be on the shelves sometime next year. For now, I need time to write, so [...]

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Regina Doman on Deathly Hallows - This is a must-read for all those who were disappointed with Book 7. It gets at the real heart of the series.
John Granger begins a series on alchemy in Deathly Hallows.
Mrs. Lovegood lists her favorite quotes from Deathly Hallows. There were a lot of great, great lines [...]

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The Meaning of the Phoenix: Love’s Victory Over Death in Harry Potter
The transcript of this pubcast is also available.
Remember that you can subscribe through iTunes, and also that you can say nice things about me there. Search for “Hog’s Head PubCast.”
Update: I knew a few months ago when I read about Garuda and the [...]

 

 Hog's Head PubCast #33: The Meaning of the Phoenix [24:40m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1634)

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This essay is also available in audio form in PubCast #33.
From The Epic of Gilgamesh to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the question of death has been explored in the pages of literature, not least in mythological works. There is hardly a more universal human experience than death, and its chilling finality has caused [...]

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Update: Virtuous Wizardry and John Granger take on O’Brien.
Atheists and Fundamentalists, that is. Or in this case, fundamentalist-type Catholics. Michael O’Brien is out with another anti-Potter essay which terribly misunderstands the series. I have no time to respond to this now (Behold a Phoenix, you want to take a shot at [...]

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Regular commenter David Jones, better known here as “Dave the Longwinded,” has contributed the following essay.  I commend it to your careful attention, and I look forward to your comments!
“Toward an Epistemology of Interpretation”

a2a_linkname=”Guest Essay: Toward an Epistemology of Interpretation, by David Jones”;
a2a_linkurl=”http://thehogshead.org/2007/08/17/guest-essay-toward-an-epistemology-of-interpretation-by-david-jones/”;

[...]

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When Albus and Aberforth were young lads, despite Albus’s prolific magical talent, Aberforth was the better man. Albus’s heart was not with his family. The death of Ariana rattled everything for both of them.
For Albus, watching his friend cruciate his brother and (probably) kill his sister wrecked him for good. “He was [...]

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John has posted part 1 of 3 of his Prophecy 2007 talk on the Christian Content of Deathly Hallows.  This is a must-read.

a2a_linkname=”John Granger on Deathly Hallows’ Christian Content”;
a2a_linkurl=”http://thehogshead.org/2007/08/14/john-granger-on-deathly-hallows-christian-content/”;

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I was very pleased with myself. After some initial, desperately-needed help with putting the SoG design onto the new theme, I spent the entire weekend working out the bugs and making it look right. I checked it in Firefox. Looks good. I checked it in Safari. Looks good. All [...]

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A threefold look at Voldemort: Literary (Shadow/Symbol of Evil), Psychological (Sociopath/Narcissistic Personality Disorder), and Ethical (Sinner/Moral Culpability).
Welcome to new PubCast listeners who have found us because of Prophecy 2007. I hope you enjoy the podcast and stick around here for discussion. You can subscribe through iTunes. Search for “Hog’s Head PubCast.”
Pub Menu [...]

 

 Hog's Head PubCast #32: Voldemort: Shadow, Sociopath, Sinner [45:13m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1511)

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