Here is a handy list of the Best HogPro posts of 2007. I put it up today to mark the first anniversary of this weBlog and to say “thank you” to the HogPro All-Pros whose questions and comments spurred this writing. We started out this WordPress format HogPro on Western Christmas Day 2006 and even with a six week blackout due to a crashed server and spectacularly unresponsive host (not to mention full time work and a good sized family) the blog has >300 posts and just short of 3000 comments from y’all. It’s been a very exciting and edifying year! Thank you for making the ride as enjoyable and engaging as it has been.
(1) The Dante Posts
— (A) Florence and Hermetic Artistry
— (B) Lily and Beatrice: Snape’s Green-Eyed Deliverance
— (C) The Epilogue’s White Rose
(2) Gay Dumbledore and an Author’s Control of Canon Post Publication
–(A) “Taking Stories More Seriously than the Author”
–(B) O’Connor, Shelley, and Interpreting Beyond Intentio Auctoris
–(C) Why Ms. Rowling Won’t Shut Up — and Why That is a Good Thing
(3) Potter Week and Pre-Publication Predictions
–(A) Bad Snape: Machiavelli’s Half-Blood Prince
–(B)Going Through the Veil and The Meaning of the Veil
–(C) Ms. Rowling’s “Near Dead” Comments (2000): Thread 1 and Thread 2
–(D) The Meaning of the Title “Deathly Hallows”
(4) Harry Potter as “Shared Text:” Defining a Generation of Readers
(5) Contra Potter Critics
— (A) Lev Grossman
— (B) Michael O’Brien
— (C) Alan Jacobs
— (D) Fr. Aguilar
— (E) Harold Bloom
(6) Christian Content of Deathly Hallows
(7) Literary Alchemy
–(A) Alchemy in Deathly Hallows
–(B) Jung, Burckhardt, or McLean?
–(C) The New Age Alchemy wing in Fandom
–(D) Alchemy and the Tarot
–(E) Dragon’s Blood and Wand Cores
(8) The 30 Deathly Hallows Threads
(9) The Epilogue
–(A) An Eliot Reference?
–(B) or Victor Hugo?
–(C) The Epilogue’s White Rose
(10) The Power of Suggestion and Setting in Advertising and Literature
FYI, the posts that received far and away the most hits were the Potter Week Predictions, especially Machiavelli!Snape and the Title Notes, and Gay Dumbledore; we averaged well over 15,000 hits a day during frenetic July, a height we hit again on one day (because of links from other sites) after the Carnegie Hall event. Some of the things I like most, say #1, 4, and 10, didn’t get much of a response but I think they’re good work, if I had to say so myself (or, worse, have a little fit here to get others to say nice things…).
If you hate the arbitrary ranking above and want to put them in a best to not so great sequence, have at it. If there’s something I left out, lemmeno. If there’s something posted on this list that you think should be removed, tell your fellow readers about it.
Thanks again for a wonderful 2007; you all my best wishes for your health and prosperity in 2008 — Salus!
John, this is an impressive list–practically a book in itself!
There goes Thudders again, laying across and squashing my unabridged dictionary…