‘The Phoenix or the Flame’ Author Symposium: Pre-Publication Feature

February 23, 2025 by Leave a Comment

From The Rowling Library’s YouTube Channel:

“The Phoenix or the Flame: Essays on J.K. Rowling’s original plans for The Order of the Phoenix“, published by TRL Books (2025).

The authors from the essays in this book were each invited to give a presentation about their contributions.

Excerpts, abstracts, and ordering information can be found at https://www.trlbooks.com/pof

  • 0:00 – Introduction
  • 9:00 – From Dark Dementors to Luna’s Light: Brightening a Nigredo through Positive Psychology by Louise M. Freeman;
  • 18:50 – From Joyce Umbridge to ‘Missy’ Slipkiss: How the Harry Potter Characters Evolved from the Outline to the Printed Book by Alice Arganese;
  • 23:25 – Belated Bellatrix: The before and after of Advancing the Antagonist’s Arrival by Irvin Khaytman;
  • 32:00 – Angry Harry Potter and the Pointless Prophecy: Why the Most Annoying parts of Order of the Phoenix Are Intentional (And How the Outline Shows Us This) by Asher Scheiner; and
  • 40:30 – J.K. Rowling’s Phoenix ‘Ring Within a Ring’: The Structure of Harry’s Trip through the Department of Mysteries and What It Suggests about Her Planning Grids by John Granger

Tomorrow, 24 February, is Publication Day! Order your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

The price I’m seeing late on Sunday night is an incredible $9.99; I don’t know if that is a Publication Day special or what, but best to order today, regardless, for a great book at a great price!

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes, Rowling Library

This Is A Test of the HogwartsProfessor Broadcasting Network, It Is Only a Test

February 22, 2025 by Leave a Comment

This a video from the ‘Wizard Reading Formula’ online series of classes I rolled out in 2017. As I work to update those classes — we’ve learned so much in the last eight years, no? — I wanted to see if the Vimeo platform on which those classes are stored can be used here on a WordPress weblog like HogwartsProfessor.

If you can see the video above, you get a free class on ring composition using Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped as the source text. I’m not attaching all the materials I sent the friends in that trial class but you’ll get to see the same process I use for all my book ‘Part’ or chapter set work with Cormoran Strike or book-as-a-whole effort. Nick joined me in charting the first Part of Ink Black Heart on my most recent trip to Wales: [Read more…]

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes, Ring Composition

Previews of a Coming Attraction?

February 21, 2025 by Leave a Comment

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Unlocking Harry Potter

Harry Potter Headstone Found Near Forks, Washington (Not that Close…)

February 18, 2025 by Leave a Comment

At the largest graveyard in Port Townsend, ‘America’s Victorian Seaport’ on the Olympic Peninsula, a sharp-eyed serious reader found the headstone of one ‘Harold Potter:’

Here’s the close-up:

Read the November 2019 piece Real Life Muggles Named ‘Harry Potter’ for thoughts about what this might be like for those, living and dead (well, for their descendants obviously).

Regardless, fun find! Back to my formatting efforts…

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes

Possible Change in Formatting at Hogwarts Professor: Imbedded Cameo-Video with MS PowerPoint Slides

February 17, 2025 by Leave a Comment

I’m still not 100% so I haven’t made progress on the two remaining ‘Foundation Crime’ posts in that three-part series. God willing, I’ll be over this season’s bug in Oklahoma City sooner than later. What I was able to work on was a MS PowerPoint presentation for The Rowling Library’s anthology. The Phoenix and the Flame.

Because of that presentation’s brevity and the deadline for submitting it on Friday, I worked today on creating slides for the talk and how to embed a cameo-video in as many slides as I think appropriate. If I cannot figure this out (too likely I’m afraid), I will send TRL the slides and my video for them to play around with. [You’ll see it after TRL edits it into the collage of other Potter Punditry authors that have contributed to this anthology.]

I’ll try to create a ‘Foundation Crime’ video-cum-cameo tomorrow that moves that Golden Thread series forward, even if only by a Baby Step. Thank you for your patience as I try to climb this techno formatting Fuji!

Filed Under: Fourth Generation, Golden Threads, Ring Composition, Rowling Library