Bad Snape: Machiavelli’s Half-Blood Prince

June 16, 2007 by 28 Comments
Filed Under: Unlocking Harry Potter

HogPro is Back!

June 6, 2007 by 12 Comments

Phew! And it only took a month!

Actually, it’s something of a miracle that the site’s essays survived the crash of its server and host so I am only grateful to be back without having to start as a clean slate. Thank you, Erick, for all you have done to bring us back on line as you have. The Forums (my private boards) are in something like suspended de-animation — Stoppered Demise? — but I hope we can bring them back in some form this summer.

I leave Friday for the Sonorus Harry Potter conference outside Los Angeles where I will be talking about (surprise!) Deathly Hallows. When I return, in addition to posting about that fun event, I’ll be writing about the several things that have been happening in the HogPro world while the site was vacationing at the Zossima.com home page. The Wall Street Journal article was a big deal, being interviewed for the Warner Brothers teevee special on Phoenix to be aired on A&E July 8th was fun, and even the nasty-gram from Scholastic was interesting enough to deserve some comment, too.

And, yes, more on the heretofore unknown importance of ‘Shipping on understanding literary alchemy (who knew Harry was a point to point stand-in for Alchemical Sulphur!) and, more seriously, the essay on Snape as Machiavelli’s Prince. Thank you for your patience with me during the site’s long absence and for passing the word to shared friends that HogPro is back. Now that school is out, I hope to be posting frequently through the summer. I look forward to reading what you all have been doing this past month! Time to pack for Sonorus….

Filed Under: Unlocking Harry Potter

Snape as Vitriol: The Green Lion alchemical catalyst?

May 6, 2007 by 11 Comments

I promised more than a week ago to post something about the place of Severus Snape in the alchemical drama of the Harry Potter novels. I’m still very much of two minds about this; I had hoped to post something definite but I cannot do that now. I don’t think that I’ll be sure enough of what Snape does and does not represent to say “I’m sure” until I can talk to Ms. Rowling about it.

As I don’t think I’m on her A-list for tea invitations, I will jump the gun of academic prudence instead and share with you (1) the Fandom research which has brought this to my attention, (2) my enthusiasm for this work (that is very different from what I have done or have seen elsewhere), and (3) my equally strong misgivings about it.

Let’s start with Severus Snape and my frustration in trying to see him in light of the Great Work taking place in the seven book alembic.

I have been asked several times at conventions, book stores, and on campuses when talking about the alchemy of the series what part the oily Potions Master plays. It’s a natural question, especially after I’ve detailed Ron, Hermione, and Harry’s roles and the meaning of Sirius’, Albus’, and Rubeus’ names in the black-white-red spectrum of the laboratory.

I’ve never given an answer that really satisfied me, if my interlocutors usually have been polite enough not to insist I come up with something better. Talking about Severus as both Dumbledore’s apprentice and his mirror image as an alchemist, the Gryffindor/Slytherin androgyn that is “slytherin-side-out,” is fascinating, even important (if true!), but it lacks the connect-the-dots transparency of Hermione as alchemical mercury or Sirius as the embodiment of the nigredo. I am eager to read anything that suggests something more easily understood about the character of Snape in the light of alchemy. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Literary Alchemy, Unlocking Harry Potter

The Potter-saurus: 1,500 Words HP Readers Need to Know

May 5, 2007 by Leave a Comment

Eric Randall, an editor and journalist whose work has appeared in Time, Newsweek, The Washington Post, USA Today, and the like, has written a fun book that I know my family will be using on car trips for a long time. It’s called The Pottersaurus: 1,500 Words Harry Potter Readers Need to Know and what it is is a delightful collection of the “big words” in Joanne Rowling’s oversized books. Arranged alphabetically, each word has a definition and at least one citation from a Harry Potter novel. Here’s one example, chosen randomly:

Pirouette — A spin in place. Crabbe did a pirouette in midair at the Shrieking Shack after Harry, hidden by his Invisibility Cloak, threw a stick at his back. (PA, Ch. 14) Hermione did a graceful pirouette while practicing to apparate. (HBP, Ch. 22)

My children love this stuff. They’ve been immunized sufficiently that they flee from school work dressed up as a game but they love explaining words that their parents don’t think they’ll be able to define. Best is catching dad with a britishism, though… Who knew a “pouf” was a “footstool or couch with no back”? I thought they were throw cushions.

Even better, Mr. Randall has a Pottersaurus website where you can play Word Quidditch. Forgive me for confessing that I played it between classes one day, just to hear the cheering sound effect for a few minutes (I’m not getting much of that from my cadets at the end of the year).

Highly recommended for families and for parents needing a good cheer!

Filed Under: Hog Pro Notes

Professor Mom’s Unified Theory of Everything

April 24, 2007 by 9 Comments

I am totally swamped in end-of-school dealings and fear I will be until June. The good news is that the older man my wife has been cooking for has succeeded in lowering his Prostate Specific Antigen numbers from 86 to 11 in a month and down to .42 in another month. Now that he is feeling better, I hope when school is out to be able to post at HogPro almost daily. As it is, I’ll be here on the weekends, work and family allowing.

Until the weekend, though, when I will share my thoughts on the theory that Severus Snape is the Green Lion or Alchemical Vitriol (the catalyst of the Great Work?), I do have something to keep you thinking along challenging lines. Professor Mum (sometimes ‘Mom’), whose essay on the House of Black in Who Killed Albus Dumbledore? is the talk of Fandom and driving the sales of that book, is attempting a grand synthesis of Red Hen, Swythyv, Alchemy, and her own cogent musings, to create her own Unified Theory of Everything. Chapter One is up and it’s a WOW.

See you this weekend!

John, loving the idea of a Slytherin/Gryffindor androgyn being the “Green Lion”

Filed Under: Who Killed Albus Dumbledore?