Hard as it may be to believe, more than a decade after the first book and a month before the last movies are released, I think I have figured out Ms. Rowling’s chapter to chapter writing plan for each of her books, a story scaffolding at once more obvious and pervasive than the literary alchemy and distinctive Potter hero’s journey. It affects many, perhaps even most characters’ names and may be the ultimate source of the “triangular eye” of the Deathly Hallows symbol. It’s important enough that I’ve added it as a new “key” with a chapter all its own in my updated Harry Potter Unlocked coming out this fall.
If you can’t wait for that and want to hear more about Ms. Rowling’s writing plan that shapes every chapter of every book as well as the way each book relates to the other novels in the series, I’ll be talking about it next week at New York City’s Samsung Experience in Time Warner Center in a lecture sponsored by America’s premiere fan Meet Up, ‘The Group That Shall Not Be Named.’
Details about the talk, the venue, and the cover of a new Potter Pundits talk and essay collection are below the jump!
The Talk:
Harry Potter Chapter Rings, Character Names, and Magic Mirrors: The Genius Inside the Planning of the Hogwarts Saga
Joanne Rowling has told interviewers for more than a decade that the secret of her success was “planning,” a “boring answer” she always apologizes for. But what exactly was she planning that took five years to sketch the books and six months prior to each novel’s composition? Potter Pundit John Granger, author of Harry Potter Unlocked: Seven Keys for the Serious Reader and editor of Harry Potter Smart Talk, believes she was working on embedding within her story the structures and symbols that would reflect her most profound meaning. Want to learn why Harry’s name as well as all the alliterative names and those with reduplicated letters are what they are? Curious about the Deathly Hallows symbol and what it really tells us about Ms. Rowling’s novels? Interested in why specific events happen in the chapters they do in each book and why there are seven novels? Come to the Samsung Center to hear John Granger reveal at last the genius in Rowling’s planning and how it generated Potter-mania
The Venue: Thursday, 7 October, 6 pm
Time Warner Building
3rd Floor Columbus Circle
New York, NY 10019
The Sponsors and more about the event: The Group That Shall Not Be Named
You should come be enlightening in the Northwest.
Or the Southwest…
Or NorCal…
(p.s. where do we pre-order the new Unlocking?)
Or Western Washington (“The Authentic Northwest”…our new motto). And I also ask where and when I can pre-order a signed copy!
I’ll take Western Washington… I’m just in the Valley in Oregon anyway. 🙂
will there be any way to view this talk on the Internet or will I have to wait for the book?