Two things I like about this chapter: Romance and Politics.

I won’t attempt to summarize the whole chapter since there’s so much packed in there. Instead, I’ll have some random thoughts on things that stood out for me.

As the chapter begins, Harry is dreaming of Voldemort searching for Gregorovitch. For HP obsessives, we should remember way back to Goblet of Fire and the passing reference to Gregorovitch as Krum’s wand maker. Did anyone catch this on first reading DH? I don’t think I did. This reference, combined with the actions of Harry’s wand three chapters ago, should get us thinking about wands and wand-lore as something important to which we should pay attention throughout the story.

Harry’s Birthday Gifts

Harry also turns of age in this chapter. He can legally do magic and immediately indulges himself in doing so with some occasional comic results. I’ll deal with Ron’s gift in a moment. But he receives a new Sneakoscope, which will be used later in the camping scenes as a backdrop; a new razor, which we don’t see again, a box of Wheezes from Fred and George, part of which is used later at the Ministry, and a moleskin purse from Hagrid which Harry uses throughout the book. Mrs. Weasley also makes him a Golden Snitch cake. We’ll see another snitch in a moment.

I’ll also deal with Ginny’s gift in a moment. Arthur and Molly’s gift shows how much they have already adopted Harry into their family. He receives Fabian Prewett’s old watch. We also see how much Harry has come to adopt the Weasleys as his family as he immediately gives Mrs. Weasley a warm hug, trying to convey all of his feelings to her through it.

Romance: Ginny’s Kiss

Now, on to romance. Ron, as much as he is a frustrating character at times and dreadfully immature, seems to be growing up a bit in this chapter. He takes Fred and George’s gift of 12 Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches to heart. He shows that he now knows that Hermione is the girl he likes, and he’s willing to make changes in himself to get closer to her. He also thinks the book good enough to get Harry a copy.

Ginny’s gift to Harry, her kiss, is a moment that always touches me. Being an incurable romantic and all, I thought the kiss between them and the moments leading up to it felt real. It shows that although Ginny is willing to stand aside to Harry’s quest, she’s also going to show him that she’s not going to let that stand in the way of her love for him. I think this is some of Rowling’s best writing because it’s human.

Ron’s reaction to the kiss is also important, because while Ginny doesn’t need protecting, we probably wouldn’t think much of a brother who didn’t want to protect his sister. Ron’s reaction is noble, if perhaps misplaced. When we love someone we want to keep them from being hurt. We may not like it when our loved ones try to protect us but I also think we wouldn’t like it if they took some sort of stoic attitude towards us and never showed any emotion at all.

Politics: Scrimgeour vs. Harry

Anyway, I’ve left so little space for the politics. Scrimgeour’s visit is very tense and very uncomfortable. His attitude is brusque, abusive, and arrogant. To some extent, you can’t really blame the guy. Things aren’t going well. But Scrimgeour, like most politicians and bureaucrats, seems to be more concerned not with winning the war but with protecting the Ministry and the status quo. Sure, he wants to defeat Voldemort but not in the same selfless way Harry does.

Scrimgeour only wants to use Harry to further the goals and prestige of the Ministry. Beat Voldemort but only in a Ministry approved manner. To this end, he abuses what seems like another well-intentioned law that doesn’t really work out in real life, holding up the execution of Dumbledore’s will in order to further his own ends. Scrimgeour wants to use Harry the Chosen One but he doesn’t have faith in Harry as the Chosen One and by extension he has no faith in Dumbledore.

Dumbledore’s Gifts

And now to whirlwind through the rest of the stuff. Who wasn’t scratching their heads and pondering deeply the meaning of the gifts Dumbledore left to the Trio? The Deluminator, The Tales of Beedle the Bard, the Snitch Harry caught in his first Quidditch game, and the intended but not given Sword of Gryffindor. How were these going to play into the story? I also found it interesting that Ron mentions every tale from Beedle except for the two that underline the quest of this story, Horcruxes (Warlock’s Hairy Heart) versus Hallows (The Tale of the Three Brothers).

I found it both hilarious and sad that when asked if she’s considered a career in the Ministry Hermione says she hopes to do some good in the world. And then she ends up in the Ministry. What a waste! Finally, I find it quite remarkable that Harry and Ron, Quidditch fanatics (the only book Harry’s ever read besides the Prince’s potions book is Quidditch Through the Ages), have no clue that snitches have flesh memories!

So, I leave you with these words, “I open at the close.”

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Hello patrons of the pub, and welcome to gender studies and Harry Potter!

In the new, wonderfully edited book Hog’s Head Conversations: Essays on Harry Potter (which you should go buy. Just sayin’) I wrote the chapter titled “Ginny Weasley: Girl Next-Doormat?” To get things rolling, here’s the intro to the chapter:

Among the female characters in her age group, Ginny Weasley is one of the stronger girls we encounter throughout the Harry Potter series; however, her role as Harry’s future and actual love interest limits her development. Ginny is kept in the periphery of the first four books, marginalized from the main story (read: Harry’s story) until Harry begins to mature and girls become sexually interesting. Even when her actions indirectly constitute the main plot line of Chamber of Secrets, Ginny is never central to the story of The Boy Who Lived. Many fans have noted that Ginny’s position as the first girl to be born into the Weasley family in generations must mean that she holds importance to the story. But as J.K. Rowling reveals, that importance lies in being Harry’s love object, not in destabilizing Voldemort’s reign of terror. Ginny has shown herself to be a powerful witch, yet that power to fight is secondary, as in many gender-role-enforcing narratives, to her destiny to marry. Throughout the series, Rowling implements various narrative tropes that reinforce her construction of Ginny as traditional wife, from having Harry save her life to beginning their erotic relationship in terms of exchange between men (Harry and Ron). When the trio embark on their extended camping trip, Harry fashions Ginny into the personification of peace time and normalcy, Hegel’s “Beautiful Soul,” that he can reminisce about on lonely nights away from home. As the time for open war is upon him, Harry refuses Ginny the agency to transcend this role and become the fighter that she clearly desires to be. Even when her skills in battle are evident, Harry’s paternalism continually attempts to restrain Ginny; her desire to defeat the Dark Lord means little in the face of Harry’s desire to restrict her in the name of “protection.” Ultimately, though she has shown herself to be a gifted and spirited witch, Ginny is defined by her relationship to Harry rather than on her own terms or in her own right. As with too many potentially powerful female characters before her, Ginny Weasley is forced to subjugate her agency in service of Harry’s desires and his hero’s journey.

The reaction I often get when people hear me describe this essay is, “Why don’t you like Ginny? She’s great.”

Yes, Ginny is a great character, and I certainly don’t hate her. My feminist ire is directed at Rowling in this case. She sacrifices Ginny to feed Harry’s traditional happy ending in nearly the same way that Tom Riddle tried to sacrifice her to bring himself fully back to life in CoS. Ginny has a fiery personality, that’s part of why I like her so much, but that spark seems non-existent once we get to the epilogue. She’s Harry’s wife and mother to his children, and she says or does little beyond the boundaries of that role.

So let’s start there: is Rowling betraying her character (and her feminist readers) by limiting Ginny to, and within, her romantic attachment to Harry? Or is Ginny’s story arc and personal development simply the logical progression of young female characters in love with male heroes? To borrow a phrase from Snape, has Rowling created Ginny to be a pig for slaughter?

Enjoy this post? Read Gwen’s whole essay, and 9 other fantastic essays, in Hog’s Head Conversations: Essays on Harry Potter! Order your copy today!

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Half-Blood Prince’s final chapter opens with a favorite device of Ernest Hemingway, the simple declarative sentence:

“All lessons were suspended, all examinations postponed.”

It really is one of Rowling’s finer moments as a writer, poignant and rich with subtlety.  In this one statement, she wipes away all the carefree wonderment of childhood with pointed irony.  Hogwarts shifts in symbolism from a place of comfort and safety where the worst worry was two parchments on werewolves for horrible Professor Snape, to a place in which parents are spiriting their children away as fast as possible because Snape has murdered the headmaster.

We see the Centaurs and Merfolk gather and pay their respects in ways I believe would have left Dumbledore deeply honored.  His entombment is rich with symbolism, as Harry thinks “for one heart-stopping moment, that he [sees] a phoenix fly joyfully ino the blue.”  Yet, the “next second the fire had vanished,” and a brilliant “white marble tomb” sits in its place.

In Dumbledore’s death, Voldemort has seemingly gained a devastating victory. Harry and Hogwarts no longer have their protector.  The last bastion of paradise is now vulnerable — very vulnerable. Hogwarts has become, in one sense, a graveyard.

A palpable threat glares at us from the edges of this chapter, never clear and explicit, but there nonetheless. It peers at us from the Riddle mansion. The effect is amplified in the explicit declarations that our enchanting rhythm of nearly six long books has been broken.  We’re no longer tied to time as it is dictated in school.  Instead, everyone’s concerns take on much more urgent tones, emanating from a great emergency — war and death. Like the disjointed feeling new-minted graduates experience upon leaving school for “the real world,” so, too, with the Wizarding World as we’ve known it. Rowling is playing with an emotional realism like never before. Even as the Trio debate whether or not Hogwarts will be open in the next year, Harry makes it clear to readers that it doesn’t matter:  “I’m not coming back even if it does reopen.” The chapter’s overriding emotion is not only sadness, but anxiety.

Harry understands his childhood is over.  Yet, Rowling isn’t ready to declare him “ready.”  To lift a line from another heroic opus, Harry must complete his training.  In Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, Yoda’s warning to Luke refers to a need to complete both a physical and mental training that prepares him to confront ultimate evil in the form of his father.  The trope is a common one, and often serves as a way to remove our Hero’s wise mentor out from under him.  In Half-Blood Prince, Dumbledore is taken from Harry so that Harry has to complete his heroic quest on his own.

I’ve always argued that HBP’s central plot thread is Dumbledore’s intense efforts to educate Harry in a more hazardous, yet consequential, way of engaging Voldemort — the fine art of speculation and inferrential reasoning.  The Pensieve lessons are always about piecing together incomplete pieces of Voldemort’s past so as to anticipate his plans.

Yet, there are sharp indications that Harry still has much to learn now that he has been thrust prematurely into his adulthood.  Trying to decipher who might be R.A.B, his feelings betray him:

He did not fell the way he had so often felt before, excited, curious, burning to get to the bottom of a mystery, he simply knew that the task of discovering the truth about the real Horcruxes had to be completed before he could move a little farther along the dark and winding path stretching ahdead of him, the path he and Dumbledore had set out upon together, and which he now knew he would have to journey alone.  There might still be as many as four Horcruxes out there somewhere. … He kept reciting their names to himself, as though by listing them he could bring them within reach.

This picture starkly contrasts what we’ve seen from Harry before.  Whenever confronted with a problem, excitement and curiosity have coursed through him, often uncontrollably.  Philosopher’s Stone describes his first use of the Invisibility Cloak in terms of pure adrenaline:  “The whole of Hogwarts was open to him…”  Yet, in two years Harry has watched both Sirius and Dumbledore die as his intelligence and heroism failed him.  His rash dash into the Ministry’s aptly named Department of Mysteries ends in tragedy.  One year later, he can do nothing whatsoever to fight off Dumbeldore’s killers.  In two crucial moments, Harry believes that his greatest attributes have betray him completely.

Now, harry must rely on the kind of reasoning (incomplete as its bases may sometimes be) in order to think through the journey in front of him. And we see examples of incomplete thoughts seeping forth from Harry:

Neville and Luna alone of the D.A. had responded to Hermione’s summons the night that Dumbledore had died, and Harry knew why: They were the ones how had missed the D.A. the most… probably the ones who had checked their coins regularly in the hope that there would be another meeting.

The ellipsis points the reader to something omitted here.  Harry attaches a kind of childish need-to-belong to their loyalty.  Yet, I don’t think it’s a stretch at all to add that Neville and Luna missed the D.A. the most because they believed in its cause.  It was surely one of the first places either had experienced social acceptance, but they also chose what was right over what was easy. And Neville will prove it in grim and terrifying fashion at the end of DH.

Harry’s breakup with Ginny is another pointer that Harry hasn’t quite thought his plan through.  As Harry laments what might have been, Ginny’s response is both knife-edged and sympathetic:  “‘But you’ve been too busy saving the Wizarding World,’ siad Ginny, half laughing. ‘Well…I can’t say I’m surprised.  I knew this would happen in the end.  I knew you wouldn’t be happy unless you were hunting Voldemort.  Maybe that’s why I like you so much.’”  Without question she resents his choice here, but accepts it without too much protest.  There’s a sense in which she seems to say to him, “Do you really think my safety is what matters now?  Don’t you see my importance to you in all of this?”  Harry hasn’t quite recognized in his friends and true love what we as readers see in John Granger’s eloquently explicated alchemical narrative.  All of them are absolutely important for Harry’s efforts to overcome Voldemort’s plan.

In addition, we witness the Trio speculate on Snape’s motives by looking at the past hinted at in Harry’s illicit Potions book.  Snape’s lineage leads Harry to conclude quite simply that Snape is “just like Voldemort.”  As determined as Harry needs to be, this reads alongside what we learn in Deathly Hallows, as a warning against thinking dismissively.  Admittedly, Harry is thinking emotionally.  But, if we learned anything from Dumbledore in the last three chapters, it’s that facing a crisis with a calm mind and steady courage is absolutely important.  Harry has to relearn this now that his challenges have grown more sinister.

Other moments Harry takes notice of are just as compelling in light of Deathly Hallows.  The appearance of an anonymous Elphias Doge foreshadows his role in DH.  Harry dismisses the man’s eulogy because “It did not mean very much.  It had little to do with Dumbledore as Harry had known him.”  Immediately, Harry flashes to his first vision of Dumbledore and his wonderfully odd welcome to Hogwarts:  “Nitwit! Oddment! Blubber! Tweak!”  What Draco and the other Malfoys want to construe as Dumbledore’s senility, Harry recognizes as Dumbledore’s playfulness.  In light of Doge’s highly romanticized view of Dumbledore in DH, the one Harry so desperately wants to cling to, his entire performance here reads as a bright warning to Harry not to read too much into Doge’s sentiments.

Harry declares he is “Dumbledore’s man through and through,” but this final chapter is full of flashing warnings of Harry’s biggest fight to come.  He’s faced down Voldemort multiple times on pure instinct, and he’s felt the warmth of victory and chill of defeat.  He’s even forced Voldemort from his mind and body.  Along with that metaphor in Order of the Phoenix, “The White Tomb” shows us that one of Harry’s greatest foes yet to come is his own self.  Dumbledore has armed for this battle more than perhaps any other.

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My favorite image of Ginny, from the HP Lexicon.

I’ve always found Ginny Weasley fascinating, given her ever evolving role in the story and the lives of other characters.  In 2004, Rowling hedged her bets on Ginny in an online chat session:

Field: Do you plan for Ginny to take on a major character role in the next two books?

JK Rowling replies -> Well, now that Ginny has stopped being mute in Harry’s presence I think you can see that she is a fairly forceful personality (and she always has been, remember Ron saying that she ‘never shuts up’ in Chamber of Secrets)?

And the Anelli/Spartz interview generated this series of statements:

the plan was, which I really hope I fulfilled, is that the reader, like Harry, would gradually discover Ginny as pretty much the ideal girl for Harry. She’s tough, not in an unpleasant way, but she’s gutsy. He needs to be with someone who can stand the demands of being with Harry Potter, because he’s a scary boyfriend in a lot of ways. He’s a marked man. I think she’s funny, and I think that she’s very warm and compassionate. These are all things that Harry requires in his ideal woman. But, I felt — and I’m talking years ago when all this was planned — initially, she’s terrified by his image. I mean, he’s a bit of a rock god to her when she sees him first, at 10 or 11, and he’s this famous boy. So Ginny had to go through a journey as well. And rather like with Ron, I didn’t want Ginny to be the first girl that Harry ever kissed. That’s something I meant to say, and it’s kind of tied in.

One of the ways in which I tried to show that Harry has done a lot of growing up — in “Phoenix,” remember when Cho comes into the compartment, and he thinks, ‘I wish I could have been discovered sitting with better people,’ basically? He’s with Luna and Neville. So literally the identical thing happens in “Prince,” and he’s with Luna and Neville again, but this time, he has grown up, and as far as he’s concerned he is with two of the coolest people on the train. They may not look that cool. Harry has really grown. And I feel that Ginny and Harry, in this book, they are total equals. They are worthy of each other. They’ve both gone through a big emotional journey, and they’ve really got over a lot of delusions, to use your word, together. So, I enjoyed writing that. I really like Ginny as a character.

MA: Does she have a larger importance; the Tom Riddle stufff, being the seventh girl —

JKR: The backstory with Ginny was, she was the first girl to arrive in the Weasley family in generations, but there’s that old tradition of the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter and a seventh son of a seventh son, so that’s why she’s the seventh, because she is a gifted witch. I think you get hints of that, because she does some pretty impressive stuff here and there, and you’ll see that again.

Of course, in 2004, Rowling was probably trying to avoid giving away significant plot details.  But her discussion of Ginny in the Anelli/Spartz interview can be illuminating, as well.  Rowling clearly likes Ginny as a character, and who wouldn’t?  She has a force of personality that carries a sense of integrity throughout the books.  After CoS, she refuses to embarass or debase herself for attention — the most notable contrast you can find is with Lavender Brown in HBP, who seemingly adopts any number of childish endeavors to keep Ron’s attention.  Or, an even more eye opening contrast could be drawn in HBP — with Hermione.  In Chapter 15, Hermione reduces herself to announcing a date with the pompous and perpetually alpha Cormac McClaggen, prompting Harry to “ponder in silence the depths to which girls would go to seek revenge.”

I find Ginny to be a proud character in many ways.  While Hermione, the books’ major female protagonist, find herself embroiled in a bitter emotional feud over Ron’s affections, Ginny demonstrates a maturity level in relationships beyond most of the other characters.  She spends a considerable amount of time dating Dean.  But, upon their split, she “did not seem at all upset about the split with Dean; on the contrary, she was the life and soul of the [Gryffindor quidditch] team” (Ch. 24).  By the end of HBP, once Harry splits with for her own safety, she again reacts rather calmly (although Ron confides to Harry in DH that Ginny was rather “cut up” about his decision).  As Ginny grows through her adolescence, she manages to demonstrate both a fierce dedication to what she thinks is right and maintain a very level head in what would otherwise be extremely emotional moments.  Thus, she shares both one character trait with Harry, while manifesting a character trait Harry is sometimes in desperate need of.

Given her place within her family, it’s easy to understand how Ginny has developed these qualities.  Mental and physical toughness would be a requirement with six older brothers of the Weasley stripe, not to mention the financial hurdles.

This characterization is a particularly deft move on Rowling’s part, I think.  While Ginny is clearly fulfilled in her relationship with Harry, we’re also led to believe that Ginny would not “need” Harry to have a full life.  By the time DH begins, and Ginny’s “present” to Harry for his birthday shows her deep affection for him, but this has to be read in light of the strength she has shown earlier.  Ginny manages to synthesize these qualities into a very coherent portrayal of strength stays in Harry’s field of view throughout the final two books, and even part of OotP.  Indeed we could argue that much of Harry’s strength in DH is derived from Ginny’s influence.  Although partially due to our perspective as readers, the evidence does suggest that Harry is far more dependent on her than she is upon him.  Even though Harry has made the choice to protect Ginny by separating from her, he instinctively feels the need “to hug her; to hold on to her,” unconcerned if Mrs. Weasley is watching in the aftermath of their escape from the Death Eater ambush in the opening of DH (Ch. 5).  While it’s obvious later in the chapter that Ginny’s concern brings her emotions outward, Ginny still demonstrates strength in these moments.

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I’ll admit from the start, I’m not one for the “shipping” debates (which student should date which). Nevertheless, there is some importance to the whole dating scene, not least the fact that Rowling’s a big fan of Austen’s novels, so romance will undoubtedly play a part.

In case you’re unfamiliar with the shipping debates, there are a few different camps, and the debate can get really heated. There’s Harry/Hermione, Harry/Ginny, Ron/Hermione, Harry/Luna, Ron/Luna. I know there are others, but those are the main camps. Of course, HBP answered many of these questions: Harry/Ginny became a reality, and Ron/Hermione is just about as close to reality as you can imagine. No surprises here, really: there were hints and foreshadowings all along, and the Ron/Hermione pairing (even if it never comes to perfect fruition in the series) is an alchemical necessity (alchemy series still pending, stay tuned).

But who is Ginny? We’ve been told relatively little about this character, which is strange because she ends up being the hero’s girlfriend. In short, we’re introduced to her as a whiny little girl who has an infatuation with Harry and gets tricked by a magic diary into almost killing people. Not good so far. As she grows up, she becomes good at Quidditch and at snogging. She moves through boyfriend after boyfriend, and it turns out in all of it she was still holding out hopes for Harry. What do we make of this? We’ve been given pretty much zero dialogue between Harry and Ginny, especially after their relationship begins. In short, it’s easy to see why some people favor Hermione as the right partner for our hero – we know her (the good and bad), and we love her. Ginny’s sort of a mystery with an attitude.

But I like Ginny, and not just ’cause Harry likes her. I’ll agree from the start with the complaints that we’ve just not been shown enough of Ginny. In some ways, it almost feels like we’re supposed to like her because she’s “hot” or something. It’s quite odd that Rowling has not given us a better picture of this character, and we hope she’ll turn out to be something really special in Book 7.

Nevertheless, I like her, and I know why Harry likes her. We’ll take most of this from a “literary criticism” standpoint to try to figure out why Ginny is necessary.

Anima/Animus
Ginny is Harry’s anima. Quick (and inadequate) summary: anima refers to feminine traits, and animus, masculine. The two must meet and be drawn to each other, becoming more like one another (meeting somewhere in the middle). It’s where all that “getting in touch with your feminine side” talk comes from, guys. It’s the whole “opposites attract” thing, and to be “whole” (or whatever), the two need to influence each other. Let’s put this together using Harry and Ginny.

The Anima and the Mother
If I recall my archetypes properly, the animus’s (Harry’s) anima (Ginny) often carries characteristics quite similar to a Good Mother figure; we’ve all heard it said that guys are often initially attracted to women who remind them of their mothers, and women, the same with guys who are like their fathers. In Harry’s case, his initial mother figure is Petunia, an obviously bad mother. Mrs. Weasley, on the other hand, is a good and positive Mother, and Ginny, at one point in HBP, gives a look almost identical to Mrs. Weasley. In fact, you can’t really get more like the Mother figure than her own daughter! So if Mrs. Weasley represents the caring, nurturing mother for Harry, Ginny is an obvious attraction for him.

Ginny’s character
We know precious little about Ginny, but we know she’s fiery. Harry needs that. For the first 11 years of his life, he wasn’t much allowed to be himself at all. He’s still having trouble asking questions, because he was told from day one: “Don’t ask questions!” He needs someone with attitude, who is certain of herself, to bring him out of his shell even more.

Then there’s the snogging. We know Harry is…well, timid around girls. The whole Cho debacle was a mystifying experience for Harry. With Ginny, there’s no tip-toeing around, no having to guess at what Ginny is feeling. She’ll tell you, and she might punch you if she’s angry. And she obviously has no problem showing affection and expressing her desires – Harry certainly got his chance to practice his “snogging” technique with Ginny as a girlfriend. (Of course, as Ginny’s animus, Ginny needs Harry to pull her to a more balanced way of thinking as well).

Ginny, the Anti-Susan
But I’ve been thinking lately that there might be one more way of looking at Ginny that might help us understand who she is a bit better. In an interview shortly after the release of Half-Blood Prince, she repeats an old line of complaint against C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series:

“There comes a point where Susan, who was the older girl, is lost to Narnia because she becomes interested in lipstick. She’s become irreligious basically because she found sex,” Rowling says. “I have a big problem with that.”

While I think this is an unfortunate reading of Lewis, if Rowling buys it, it might make a lot of sense for her to create Ginny the way she has. Ginny has certainly “found sex,” and she’s teaching it to Harry, our inhibited hero (I don’t mean to suggest that they’ve slept together at all. Rowling has stayed far clear of that, and I’m happy she has). In fact, while the Pevensies are four (Lucy, Edmund, Susan, and Peter), the Hogwarts heros are three (Harry, Ron, Hermione) except for a short spell (haha) in Book 6. Making Ginny the fourth might be her way of saying, in subtle fashion, “Susan should have been included.”

So, for what it’s worth, there’s my short contribution to the ’shipping wars. Harry/Ginny makes sense for literary reasons. I do hope that we learn more about Ginny in Book 7. It’ll be difficult to fit it in, with so much to reveal about Snape, Dumbledore, Neville, James and Lily. I fear we’ll end up short-changed on Ginny again. But even some sort of brave contribution to the war would be helpful. Perhaps if there’s an attack at the Bill-Fluer wedding?

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