As we look forward to the release of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them in just a few days, eager viewers will doubtless be trying to pick up any element in the film that connects us to the Wizarding World we already know. From examining last names to see if any of the characters are relations of Harry’s school chums to hoping for glimpses of Dumbledore in that velvet suit he clearly bought at the Oscar Wilde estate sale, we’ll be looking for overlaps from Harry’s story into this, a totally different story from the same universe. One of the most interesting overlaps comes in the form of luggage. We are all eager (or terrified) to see what Newt Scamander is lugging about in his suitcase. Ron’s money is probably on something “mad and hairy.” But that case, and its unique properties, connect to a few other items in the Wizarding World, and to a whole host of other literary items that have insides bigger than their outsides. It’s a great plot device, and one that has a wonderful lineage, so let’s visit that little spot in the literary shopping mall where that suitcase must have originated, and spend a short while chatting about some of its predecessors in the Wizarding World and beyond.
Pack Your Bags! Newt Scamander’s Fantastic Beast-y Suitcase, Hermione’s Handbag, and their Literary Relatives
Throwback Thursday with Narnia, Newt Scamander, and Fantastic Beasts: Part II
Following up last week’s part one on the influence of C.S. Lewis on J.K. Rowling’s cast of creatures, here is the second part of the paper (though edited) that I originally presented at the 2005 Witching Hour conference in Salem, Massachusetts, a lovely event that set me off on the last decade of Potter scholarship.
As we pack our bags (ones that hold many very interesting things) for another journey into the Wizarding World with Newt Scamander and his Fantastic Beasts, we pick up after examining the heraldic animals of Hogwarts as they connect to Narnia, as well as connections with domestic animals and wildlife.
Now, we’ll head off the map a bit, more into Newt’s territory, as we look at creatures more up his alley–that long scary alley with something scuttling over behind the bins….
Throwback Thursday with Narnia, Newt Scamander, and Fantastic Beasts: Part I
As we’ll doubtless be covering in the weeks to come, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is flying, crawling, and stomping into theaters this month. While we are all interested to see more of the wizarding world, I am particularly intrigued, as that slim red volume actually launched me into serious academic scholarship into the Potter-verse.
In 2005, I attended my first national Harry Potter Conference, The Witching Hour in Salem, MA. There I presented my paper, “Fantastic Beasts: C. S. Lewis, J. K. Rowling, and the Menagerie of the Imagination,” a project that I began while I was reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe aloud to my son. Though I had already worked extensively with the Chronicles of Narnia, I noticed something during those read-alouds that I had missed in dozens of re-reads: when Peter, Edmund, Susan, and Lucy arrive at the home of Professor Kirke, they speculate on the animals they will see, listing, specifically, eagles, stags, hawks, badgers, and snakes.
Taken with Aslan, who is the Lion of the title and at the back of all the stories, there in the first few pages of the first of the Chronicles of Narnia (yes, it is the first one, no matter what misguided publishers do to the order), we have the four Hogwarts House mascots and Harry’s Patronus.
When I made that head-slapping connection, I did not realize that, more than 10 years later, I would be thoroughly immersed in Potter scholarship and that the story of Fantastic Beasts would be appearing on the big screen, but I did know that I had made a magical discovery, one that propelled me through the paper for the conference and into a wonderful journey of literary analysis and exploration. So, as we gear up for Newt’s big screen debut and since Thursday is a day when we throw back, here is part one of a selection from that paper, greatly edited from its original bulk (my poor patient audience at the Witching Hour!), and an invitation, as always, to share your thoughts, and perhaps, your own experience with the intrepid Newt Scamander and his role in your Potter studies.
Voldemort, Delphini, and Oedipus: Complex Folks and Cursed Children
As we continue our thoughts on the recently released rehearsal script of The Cursed Child, one of the big questions early on was the identity of the titular child, but there is really more than one cursed child in the story. In fact, some of the most fascinating elements of the play tie in with one of the most unfortunate children (and adults) in all of literature, Sophocles’ Oedipus; Voldemort’s story already has powerful overtones from that of Oedipus, and this tale continues that trend, with subtle, and not-so-subtle, reminders that He-With-No-Nose and He-with-the-Swollen-Foot are both prophecy-haunted products of broken families whose harmful choices ripple outward to damage all those around them, right up to the blue-haired gal in the new play. (Fair warning, spoilers galore)
Re-Hashing, Re-working, and Resurrection: The Cursed Child and Why Authors Cannot Settle for Re-Visiting their Texts.
In a few days, bookstores will be beset by eager readers, online vendors will mail out hordes of pre-ordered packages, and costumed f
ans will squeal with delight as they crack a fresh cover. Like the days of old when the release of a new Harry Potter book incited epic expectation and fan reaction, the publication of the rehearsal script for the first two parts of the play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, is already surrounded by attention that not only echoes the releases of the seven books in the Hogwarts Saga, but that also recalls the kind of fascination and frenzy that has prompted other artists to do what J.K. Rowling has done: trying to re-create a phenomenon when the original source of that phenomenon, at least from an artistic and symbolic standpoint, has concluded and needs no further additions.
When C. S. Lewis completed his seven-book Chronicles of Narnia, he resisted requests for more installments, even suggesting that readers who enjoyed the novels should write their own stories. Other authors have not been as able to resist the attraction of trying to return, again and again, to the fictional worlds they have created, even when the journey has been completed. While J.K. Rowling is already being censured by Potterphiles and critics alike for engaging in an unnecessary new story or tampering with the cohesive artistic unity of Harry’s story by collaborating on what will inevitably be mislabeled the “eighth Harry Potter novel,” she is certainly not the first author to engage in such shenanigans, and it is unlikely she will be the last. So why do they do it? Why do authors, like filmmakers, actors, and other artists, go back to a completed work and add to it? [Read more…]
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