by Travis
As I announced yesterday, The Hog’s Head is giving away three free audiobooks in the form of Brilliance Audio’s “The Myths Collection.”
- Karen Armstrong, A Short History of Myth: What are myths? How have they evolved? And why do we still so desperately need them? Heralding a major series of retellings of international myths by authors from around the world, Karen Armstrong’s characteristically insightful and eloquent book serves as a brilliant and thought-provoking introduction to myth in the broadest sense - and why we dismiss it only at our peril.
- Margaret Atwood, The Penelopiad: In a splendid contemporary twist to the ancient story of Penelope and Odysseus, Margaret Atwood has chosen to give the telling of it to Penelope and to her twelve hanged Maids, asking: “What led to the hanging of the maids, and what was Penelope really up to?” In Atwood’s dazzling, playful retelling, the story becomes as wise and compassionate as it is haunting, and as wildly entertaining as it is disturbing.
- Jeannette Winterston, Weight: In ancient Greek mythology, the victorious Olympians force Atlas, guardian of the Garden of Hesperides and its golden apples of life, to bear the weight of the earth and the heavens for eternity. With her typical wit and verve, Jeanette Winterson brings Atlas into the twenty-first century. Simultaneously, she asks her own difficult questions about the nature of choice and coercion, and how we forge our own destiny.
How to Enter Your Name for the Giveaway
It’s very, very simple this time. I’m looking for feedback for this site, particularly on subjects that we haven’t covered or haven’t covered sufficiently. You need to leave a comment on this post with one specific idea for a topic to be covered in the future here at The Hog’s Head. “Specific” is the key:
- Bad Example: “Mythology” - way too broad
- Good Example: “Comparing Harry with Beowulf” - much more specific; and it’s even better if you write something like, “Comparing Harry with Beowulf: compare and contrast their identities as ‘Christian’ heroes”
- Bad Example: “More Character Studies” or even “Delores Umbridge”
- Good Example: “The Psychology of Delores Umbridge: why does she take so much pleasure in inflicting pain?” (suggested recently)
You can only enter your name once, so come up with a good idea. If it’s too general, I’ll ask you to submit again. You have until midnight, EST on Friday, July 11, at which time comments will close. I’ll have some random person at Portus draw from the hat.
Chelsea on 
Red Rocker on 
revgeorge on 
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{ 26 comments… read them below or add one }
revgeorge
07.02.08 at 9:51 pm
Perfect timing. I just had an idea discussing something over at HP Progs on their latest podcast. Here goes: Examining the nature & quality of the friendship of the Marauders, especially Pettigrew vis a vis James & Sirius.
Black Angus
07.03.08 at 5:01 am
I’ve always been interested in a Muggle’s-eye-view. I’m meant to identify with Harry et al but in reality I’m more like the Muggle Prime Minister or (worse!) the Dursleys! I’m one of the multitudes who notice nothing peculiar on Kings Cross station. So, my question is something like: how should we as muggles accept the actions of people who help us occasionally but more often than not wipe our memories if we ever see them?
korg20000bc
07.03.08 at 8:19 am
Sexuality in Harry Potter or The “Moaning” Myrtle dilemma. Moaning (hehe) Myrtle appears to be one of the most, if not the most, sexually aware and mischevious characters in the stories. She seems to enjoy the compromising postion that Harry is in during his turn in the prefect’s bath in GoF and flirts outrageously with him. She is also the ghost of a … how many year old girl? She’s also the girl who turned to stone when a… big snake looked at her… Surely there’s more going on here than meets the eye (no Goonies jokes!)
This brings up something else. Say Moaning Myrtle died when she was 14. Does she remain a 14 year old ghost or does she continue maturing but retain the outward appearance of the 14 year old? What about the other Hogwarts ghosts?
Johnny
07.03.08 at 10:05 am
I think I might be cheating here because I always wanted to explore this and even developed a Tom Riddle fanfiction story pre-HBP that had elements of this. I’m speaking of the similarities between Oliver Twist and Tom Riddle. Using evidence from the Harry Potter series and Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens, compare the origins of Tom Riddle with Oliver Twist and contrast their childhood development and character in relation to others and their understanding of right from wrong.
Red Rocker
07.03.08 at 10:13 am
Matthew, love your take on what happened to Myrtle. I’d also be interested in the sexuality of Hepzibah Smith, Horace Slughorn, Beatrix Lestrange, Fenrir Greyback, and of course, Dolores Umbridge.
About the aging of the ghosts: I always thought they were like Anne Rice’s vampires, physically frozen at the moment of death but maturing - if one can use that word - with the passage of time.
I’m interested in Black Angus’ suggestion: how Muggles perceive and respond to witches and wizards. We don’t get to know too many Muggles, but the reactions of the ones we do meet are instructive: Vernon, Dudley, Petunia, the Prime Minister. We could also throw in the squibs into the discussion: Arabella Figg and Argus Flitch. We could also look at it from the perspective of the wizards/witches. The discussion could touch on many issues centering on the relationship between those who have power and those who lack it. Call it Muggle Studies 201: The Ethics of Interacting with the Disadvantaged.
I’m not raising these as my own suggestions, BTW, just exploring the different ways Korg’s and Black Angus’ suggestions could go.
revgeorge
07.03.08 at 10:28 am
I’d go with Matthew’s suggestion. Sex always sells. So ditch my question.
Red Rocker
07.03.08 at 10:33 am
OK, here’s my suggestion:
The correspondence of moral virtue with good hygiene in Harry Potter, or, Why don’t the bad guys go to the dentist?
It all started with the infamous debate about Snape’s underwear (and oily hair) and whether those attributes reflected moral turpitude. But there are many villainous (and semi-villainous) characters whose morality seems reflected in their appearance.
Metanarrative, or just a basic, instinctive human bias?
revgeorge
07.03.08 at 10:50 am
Can we start discussing some of these questions now? Or do we have to wait until Travis makes an official pick? I’m not sure if I can remember my thoughts if we have to wait a while to start.
Travis Prinzi
07.03.08 at 10:57 am
Let me clarify the contest: I’m not picking “the best one” as the winner. Everyone who submits one legitimate idea will be entered into the drawing, and a random Portus attendee will draw from a hat.
I’m sure everyone’s itching to discuss these, but if you don’t mind, wait till one of the Blogengamot members have posted on the subject. I am, after all, look for future post/discussion ideas, and it would defeat the purpose if we exhausted them all here
Red Rocker
07.03.08 at 11:03 am
revgeorge, don’t be too quick to ditch your own suggestion. I for one would be interested in looking more closely at the friendships of the Marauders, especially the role of Peter Pettigrew, as you suggested. We could also compare the Marauders - and Lily Evans - to Harry’s posse, his inner circle of friends consisting of Ron, Hermione, FredandGeorge, Ginny, Neville and Luna. We could also branch off to comparing Pettigrew with Ron, how there are some similarities but also profound differences. I’ve always seen Ron as someone whose loyalty and basic decency were tested by his feelings of insecurity and inferiority, and would like to hear others’ perspectives on him.
I think that if we started discussing now, we’d be pre-empting Travis’ process.
Travis Prinzi
07.03.08 at 11:23 am
And just for the record, you won’t have to wait too long - for some subjects, we won’t write up a whole analysis post. We’ll just do a discussion starter.
Pamela
07.03.08 at 2:29 pm
Topic: “The life and lies of Albus Dumbledore or Why Rita Skeeter was right”
Travis Prinzi
07.03.08 at 2:32 pm
Topic: “The life and lies of Albus Dumbledore or Why Rita Skeeter was right”
Oohh…them’s fightin’ words. But good enough to get you entered into the contest
revgeorge
07.03.08 at 4:37 pm
Okay, I’ll wait. But impatiently…
Daniel Ezell
07.04.08 at 1:32 am
I’m working on this with a student of mine, but I’d love to see more thoughts on this. Dumbledore tells Harry in The Half Blood Prince “Voldemort himself created his worst enemy, just as tyrants everywhere do!” The development of tyranny and its consequences throughout the series is very interesting among many, many characters. Perhaps a good title may be Tyrants Everywhere.
Marmee March
07.04.08 at 7:11 am
“Knights and Martyrs, or, Sacrifice and Truth-Telling [or Witnessing]: one amorphous experience, or yin and yang?”
I’ve just finished the Mars chapter in Planet Narnia by Michael Ward, which is terrific, but dense, so it’s taking me quite a while to read. His discussion of how the characters of Prince Caspian partake of the Martian/Martial spirit in different ways is what brought this topic to mind. I’m aiming for exploring the different ways HP characters experienced suffering and self-sacrifice throughout the books, such as James vis-a-vis Lily, or Arthur and Molly.
Red Rocker
07.04.08 at 10:25 am
Marmee, I can imagine that there was a lot of suffering Arthur experienced in being married to Molly, and Lily in being married to James, but surely that’s not what you mean.
Could you explain a little more what you mean by suffering and self-sacrifice in the context of the two marriages?
Brent
07.04.08 at 5:05 pm
At iTunesU there is a round table-type lecture from the Political Science Department at the University of the Pacific entitled “Harry Potter and the Politics of Literature.” I think a discussion comparing and contrasting the three lecturers’ views of the political themes that they gleaned from the series with your own Fabian, Libertarian keys to reading Rowling would be interesting.
I had thought of a couple more ideas when I was listening to the podcast, but I wasn’t near a computer or paper and didn’t right them down, so I might add them later for some more fodder if I can think of them.
Josh Wyant
07.04.08 at 8:05 pm
Hi, I’m new to the site and have enjoyed going over the old podcasts…I’m not sure if this ties into the theme of the site or even if it is what your looking for, but how about N.T. Wright’s thinking on ressurection, and any ties that you can make to Harry.
Thanks for the podcast,
Josh
Travis Prinzi
07.04.08 at 9:24 pm
Brent, thanks for the tip! I was just fishing around iTunes U earlier today looking for some new lectures to download. I’ll look for that one right away!
Josh, great, great idea. In fact, you’ll be happy to know I quote from Surprised by Hope in chapter 4 of my forthcoming book. I think Wright’s (and Lewis’s, as Matthew pointed out) theology of hell fits really well with what Rowling did with Voldemort’s soul-fragment fate at the divine King’s Cross.
Mark NIkirk
07.05.08 at 12:36 pm
How about:
A look at Remus Lupin and his ‘problem’ compared & contrasted with St Paul’s speech on the sin within him doing the things he doesn’t want to do….
Jonathan
07.05.08 at 10:48 pm
I was listening to Chamber of Secrets today. I couldn’t help but want to compare Dumbledore/MacGonagall’s teaching and disciplinary methods with those of the better teachers I had growing up - stern yet simultaneously forgiving somehow.
Red Rocker
07.10.08 at 10:22 am
I don’t know if we’re limited to one suggestion, but I thought I’d offer another one.
Because I live with a 7 year old who loves Potter and we have the HP movies on DVD, I see the HP movies more frequently than I re-read the books. And when I do re-read, I go to a specific passage rather than read the book from beginning to end.
I also spend some time at the Hog’s Head and the HogPro.
I think the net result is that my experience and understanding of HP is being shaped more by the movies (and to a lesser extent by our discussions here) than by the books themselves. There are still passages which I feel are irreplaceable - mainly from HBP and DH - but I fear that may also change once I see the movies.
So this is my topic: To what extent is our understanding of HP being influenced by the movies? Are we losing something in the shift? And if so, what are we losing?
korg20000bc
07.10.08 at 8:26 pm
Good question Red Rocker!
The discussion of this would be good. Though I doubt I’d be shifted from my pre-held opinions.
Red Rocker
07.10.08 at 9:46 pm
I agree, Matthew. I don’t think I’d be shifted from my pre-held opinions either. But I think the process is more insidious than that. I think the movies focus on certain incidents, or reconfigure them, so we remember things a certain way, which is not necessarily the way JKR wrote them. I think they are messing with our memories; I don’t mean this in a paranoid, evil conspiracy sort of way. Rather, it’s just happening simply through the fact that the movies have to edit and abridge the books in order to tell an effective story visually.
The clearest example that I’m aware of is the conversation on the bridge between Lupin and Harry. I love that scene. It has an incredible sense of Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past feel to it. And I’ve scoured the book over and over again to find it. It’s not there. JKR didn’t write it.
Marmee March
07.11.08 at 7:06 am
Red Rocker and Travis,
I didn’t mean to imply that the two married couples I mentioned suffered because of their marriage or because of each other, sorry!
They suffered because they actively resisted Voldemort, but they suffered in different ways from each other. James had the choice to die or not, but it was a different kind of choice, and Lily’s death had different ramifications because of her different kind of choice. I think his choices that led to his death had been made earlier, and Voldemort did not give him another chance to step aside, as he did Lily, which again, is partly due to her earlier choices in her friendship with Severus. Likewise, Molly and Arthur both suffered, but in different ways: Arthur was bitten by Nagini, and Molly was tormented by fearing for the deaths of her husband and children.
What is this saying about the different ways of putting on your game face and taking your place in the fight? Is Rowling demonstrating a “masculine” way and a “feminine” way, as Lewis did in _Prince Caspian_? Or are there different reasons/times/ways for a man to fight than there are for a woman? That’s what I was getting at, and I may be way off base, but it was a random thought, not one I’m prepared to fully defend one way or the other.