Shared Text: Emma Watson Tops ‘Sexiest Stars’ List

October 11, 2013 by 5 Comments

The Telegraph reported today that Emma Watson was named the World’s Sexiest  Film Actress. It was their excuse for compiling all their best pictures of the young actress. For the story and the Top Ten list itself, check out the BBC.

I’m putting this news under ‘Shared Text’ for three reasons which I’ll offer as questions or observations:

(1) Without looking it up, name more than one movie in which Emma Watson appears whose title does not begin with the three words ‘Harry Potter and.‘ Draw your own conclusion.

(2) Scarlett Johansson came in second — the woman Esquire has twice named ‘The Sexiest Woman Alive’ — and Jennifer Lawrence was third. Just sayin.’

(3) Scroll through the Watson fashion pictures at the Telegraph compilation. Try not to think of the words ‘cute’ or ‘pixie’ or ‘trying too hard.’  Then read today’s Shoe comic strip:

I have to assume that, no matter how I put this, I will be assumed to be insulting the undeniably talented, intelligent, and attractive Emma Watson. So be it. Let me be brief then with my Shared Text assertion that I think stands without argument.

Except for the Harry Potter film franchise and for her having played the part of Hermione Granger, which character every reader adored on several levels of admiration and identification, no fashion designer or movie director would ever have picked this young woman for a Vogue shoot or a feature film. Hermione Granger won the Sexiest Film Actress award today because voters chose to express their warm feelings for this character.

Go ahead. Tell me how wrong I am.

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes, Shared Text

Travis Prinzi’s ‘Harry Potter For Nerds: Essays for Fans, Academics, and Lit Geeks’ traveling to Nashville, Tennessee

October 10, 2013 by 12 Comments

I was able to catch up with Travis Prinzi, the young lion of Potter Pundits, the other day and learned he is on the road to Nasville, Tennessee, for a closed door conference. I asked him for a thumbnail description and he responded:

The conference I’m speaking at is Hutchmoot, which is a gathering of Christian authors, musicians, and artists. It grew out of The Rabbit Room website, named after the famous room in The Eagle and Child where the Inklings gathered to discuss their stories. My session is described as follows:

Never Too Old for Narnia: Why Grown-ups Need Children’s Literature – Andrew Peterson, Sarah Clarkson, and Travis Prinzi explore and celebrate the realm of children’s fairy tales and fantasy, including works by Lewis, Tolkien, Goudge, and MacDonald, as well as discussing modern works by authors like J. K. Rowling and Neil Gaiman. They will look deeply into why the beauty and imaginative worlds of such stories stir and captivate readers of all ages.

I’d love to sit in on that — to hear Travis talk is always edifying and fun and because I haven’t spoken with Andrew Peterson since the meeting he described in a RabbitRoom post called ‘Harry Potter, Jesus, and Me.’ You’ll need an Invisibility Cloak to get into Hutchmoot, however, because the sponsors have limited attendance to 100 guests to be sure it’s not a mad house.

Anyone out there think we could do a HogwartsProfessor and HogsHead gathering in like fashion? Let me know if you have a venue in mind that would be willing to host a get together of 50 to 100 serious readers for some challenging conversation about better books. And would you come?

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes

Rumor Says: Warner Bros Thinking ‘Quidditch,’ Too

October 2, 2013 by 1 Comment

My memory is just good enough to remind me that way back when dinosaurs walked the earth and we didn’t even know the titles of the last two or three Harry Potter novels, there was a vocal cadre that believed much of that information could be discovered in the trademark application logs at Warner Brothers. My memory isn’t what it once was, but I think their confidence derived from at least one direct hit (Half-Blood Prince?).

These prospectors and internet researchers came to mind today when I read that “some believe” Warner Brothers is considering making a Quidditch Through the Ages film series as well as movies derived from Tales of Beedle the Bard. A story in the UK newspaper, the Independent, ‘JK Rowling’s Quidditch Through the Ages earmarked as next Harry Potter spin-off film,’ contends that Warner is “hinting” as much, based on its trademark filings.

According to website Bleeding Cool, Warner Bros has taken out several trademarks that hint at another film based on JK Rowling’s companion book Quidditch Through the Ages.

The Quidditch companion was originally released for Comic Relief 2001 alongside the fictional Hogwarts textbook Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which Warner Bros is to make into a film.

The studio has reportedly trademarked Quidditch Through the Ages, as well as the name of the book’s author, Kennilworthy Whisp, and the names of the Quidditch teams the Wimbourne Wasps, the Chudley Cannons and the Kenmare Kestrels.

I am not looking forward to the films derived from Fantastic Beasts because (a) I am not a film fan but an iconodule (cinema being the victory of the neo-iconoclasts, alas) and (b) I expect it will be another exercise a la Indiana Jones and the Potter film franchises to reduce even a smart story into a series of chases, fights, and CGI ‘wow’ opportunities for teenagers. But I get the hooks of the Newt Scamander story as it has been sketched and would certainly buy the book if it were written as a novel rather than a screenplay.

The worst parts of the Potter films and the chapters apparently Ms Rowling dreaded writing in the novels were the Quidditch matches. I don’t doubt that stories could be told around conflicts on the Quidditch pitch — Cinderella stories, On the Waterfront remakes, even Rollerball translations — but, outside of the guarantee of a big payday, why would anyone make that film?

Let’s hope that, as with the many titles Warner Brother trademarked a decade ago, that this rush to secure the rights to these titles and names is just for future pinball and XBox games.

Your comments and corrections, please, especially if you’ve got a great story line for a cinematic treatment of Quidditch Through the Ages.

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes, Movie Thoughts

PotterMore: J. K. Rowling Discusses Alchemical Colors

October 1, 2013 by 8 Comments

Michael B writes that Ms Rowling is discussing her use of alchemical symbolism at her PotterMore web site:

In the [PotterMore] section The Campsite, Jo has written some new information on colors. The first part talks about the importance of purple and green in the Wizarding World, then there’s more on the association of the house colors and their respective elements. Then, she talks about Alchemy!

The passage on alchemy specifically reads:

Colours also played their part in the naming of Hagrid and Dumbledore, whose first names are Rubeus (red) and Albus (white) respectively. The choice was a nod to alchemy, which is so important in the first Harry Potter book, where ‘the red’ and ‘the white’ are essential mystical components of the process. The symbolism of the colours in this context has mystic meaning, representing different stages of the alchemic process (which many people associate with a spiritual transformation). Where my two characters were concerned, I named them for the alchemical colours to convey their opposing but complementary natures: red meaning passion (or emotion); white for asceticism; Hagrid being the earthy, warm, physical man, lord of the forest; Dumbledore the spiritual theoretician, brilliant, idealized and somewhat detached. Each is a necessary counterpoint to the other as Harry seeks father figures in his new world.

Michael then asks me, “ Has she ever confirmed anything like this before? I was under the impression that the alchemy theory was always well informed speculation. All the best, and I’d love to hear your thoughts on this reveal.”

Thank you, Michael, for sharing this news. To answer your questions, yes, Ms. Rowling has admitted that her understanding of alchemy played a large part in how she set “the magical parameters” and “internal logic” of the Hogwarts Saga, and, my response to her comments here is something like bemusement. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes, Literary Alchemy

New Book from Suzanne Collins: Year of the Jungle

September 26, 2013 by Leave a Comment

I’m guessing even very serious Hunger Games fans may have missed the news that Suzanne Collins has written another book — and that it was published this month! The title is Year of the Jungle: Memories from the Home Front and it is a children’s picture book with illustrations by James Proimos.

The name James Proimos is the answer to one of the more difficult Hunger games trivia questions. For more on that — and the importance of Custard the Dragon’s “eating the Pyrate,” read beyond the jump. Spoiler break —

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Hunger Games