So now most folks who plan to see the film of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows have done so (some more than once), and many of you have shared your insights and thoughts in our wonderful conversation. Thanks! This week, here are some follow-up thoughts not on the film so much as on the experience of going to the movie. Join us after the jump for stories, positive and negative, on movie-going experiences, what people are doing now, and the opportunity to share your own stories of seeing the film or your plans for what’s next!
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Film Week Follow-Up:Fellowship, Freebies, and Fisticuffs
July 25, 2011 by 3 Comments
Alternate Ending? “Real-Life Snape”? Is it April Fool’s Day?
July 23, 2011 by 9 Comments
It should come as no surprise that everyone who ever had contact with J.K. Rowling now thinks that he or she has some sort of inside track on the tale of Harry Potter . (For example. we’ve heard for years about the neighbors named Potter) . Oddly enough, the folks Rowling openly describes as being part of her process (her real teenage friend with the blue Anglia, for example) seldom go about yapping about their deep personal relationship with the Presence. This week, we have an investigative reporter who thinks he knows the “original” ending to Deathly Hallows and the supposed discovery of the “real” Severus Snape. Both of these stories exhibit some interesting lack of insight into Rowling’s personality, style, and statements about her own work. So put on your favorite Headless Hat or other Weasleys’ Wizarding Wheezes product, and get ready to snort, chuckle, or sneer after the jump. [Read more…]
Mythgard Institute, Harry Potter For Nerds, and Duck of Minerva: HogPro Posts To Go Up Before the Move to Oklahoma City Begins
July 22, 2011 by 10 Comments
I am in sunny Huntsville, Alabama, where I’ve given three talks this week post LeakyCon, and I’m packing up today for my return to beautiful upstate New York. I won’t be there long, though, because I’ve been offered a teaching position in Oklahoma City and I’m moving the whole famn damily there next week.
The only problem? I have about twelve HogwartsProfessor posts that are overdue and time sensitive — and there’s no way I’m posting from the cab of a 24′ moving van with family in tow. I’m guessing that Highway Patrol officers are merciless on texters who drive — and that they shoot truck driving bloggers on sight.
Here, then, are the three ‘biggies’ I absolutely have to share before the Granger Gang starts its exodus to the Heartland:
Last Gasp of the Harry Haters? God Only Knows!
July 19, 2011 by 25 Comments
My only hesitation in posting this morning is that, by putting up a new comment, I necessarily bump Prof. Hardy’s movie review and the consequent discussion off the main stage. If you’re looking for that engaging conversation, just click here.
I post today because of the flood of e-owls I’m receiving about various Harry Haters who are putting up their fire-and-brimstone warnings about the Boy Wizard as “gateway to the occult.” What’s curious about this predictable coming-out is that there seems to be a complementary and opposite reaction from readers, believers and non-believers, excited by Harry’s Christian message.
Welcome, Movie Week Visitors, to ‘HogwartsProfessor’!
July 18, 2011 by 7 Comments
There have been a flurry of interviews and articles in print and online that have linked to this weblog in the past week because of the HP7B movie roll-out (about which, join the conversation below)– so it’s appropriate that we meet-and-greet our new guests (and provide links to the source stories for the old guard).
Welcome, then, all you Washington Post, Christianity Today, Wall Street Journal, City Life, Scripps-Howard papers, NPR, Leaky Con, Newser.com, WORD FM radio, and GetReligion first time visitors to HogwartsProfessor.com! My name is John Granger, sometimes called “the Hogwarts Professor” though here I am only one of five Potter Pundits, and, as your host today, I invite you to make yourself at home and, time allowing, surf the archives of our Harry Potter conversations and maybe even check out our threads on Twilight and The Hunger Games.
And, if you’d like, make the jump below to read the Washington Post piece as I first wrote it, which is to say, before it was transformed in the layers of editing necessary to appear in ‘Outlook,’ WaPo’s Sunday editorial section. It’s a bit different…
FYI, Zossima Press tells me that a glitch in Amazon.com’s “algorithm formulas” for titles shipped from Ingrams has caused their Potter titles — including Deathly Hallows Lectures — to list as shipping in “two to three weeks” when they are actually “in stock” and ship immediately. Don’t hesitate to purchase because of the glitch if you want to learn more about the artistry and meaning of Harry Potter!
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