The Deeper Meaning of Harry Potter Stories

In a relatively short time the latest and final edition of the Harry Potter series is going to be released. As a fan of the series I am quite excited about it. It will be fun to learn how J.K. Rowling ties up the various loose ends that currently exist.

Alongside the book are going to be a ton of analysis pieces in which amateur and professional pundits are going to deconstruct the book in an attempt to show the symbology of the book. There are many examples of this already. If you surf around the net you can find essays/blogs in which the authors claim that the whole store is an allegory for their particular faith.

This is a different sort of analysis than the posts that speculate about whether Dumbledore is truly dead, whether Snape is good or bad etc. I find those types of posts to be kind of fun, but the others just annoy me. I don't want to waste time discussing whether Snape is equivalent to Judas or Harry's use of a wand is reminiscent of the great flood blah, blah, blah.

Sometimes a story is just a story and nothing more is intended than what you see on the surface.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't think Dumbledore is dead! My son has already pre-ordered the book. I told him I have first dibs!

Another meshugannah mommy said...

That's nothing. Read the articles that discuss Alchemy and Harry Potter. Whew! I love me some HP, but that's going a bot far...

Shelli said...

Dumbledore IS dead, JK said so herself, Snape is good.

I believe that we wil discover McGonogal to be either under the imperius curse, or pollyjuiced.

tafka PP said...

Agree agree agree. I feel the same way about loose ends: I just wish she hadn't created so many more with Book 6, she'll need to spend most of Book 7 explaining everything away!

chosha said...

Agreed, agreed. I do love speculating on things like whether Snape is on the side of right or is secretly still a death eater. I have a whole elaborate theory on the Snape/Dumbledore last scene of book 6. :) I definitely think Dumbledore is dead though. He's always been the magical world's back-up plan, the only one Voldemorte is scared of. I think JKR wants the last book to be Harry, Hermione and Ron becoming adults and not having that to fall back on - being thrust into a harsh reality and stepping up. Can't wait till July.

I'm also interested to read the last book because I feel like there's still too much story to tell to cram it all into one book.

Richmond said...

And I am eagerly awaiting book 7 as well. :-) Personally, I think Dumbledore may have become a phoenix and will help Harry in the final battle. And the jury is *still* out with me whether or not Snape is a good guy.

Jack Steiner said...

I am having fun reading your theories.

Dan Balsamo said...

I agree with you on this. I hate it when critics try to relate this to various tall tales that is completely irrelevant from what Harry Potter shows its audience. I actually like the way they keep snape on the mysterious sort of wild card distinction.

Mel Balsamo
JRomances.com

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