If you haven’t seen it, please do go immediately to tvCatchUp’s link and watch the James Runcie television program, ‘J. K. Rowling: A Year in the Life.’ I don’t know how long this link will be active (the phrase “catch-up” doesn’t sound like a long term deal) and I doubt very much that a transcript will capture the value of this show. [The program is still available and will be until late February; viewers need to sign in and choose the part of the UK in which they live in their transatlantic time to have access.] For those of you who have seen it, I want to begin discussion of this remarkable work, what is perhaps the best program, article, or publication I have read or seen on Ms. Rowling’s personal life and life as a writer, with four points for your discussion to start off the New Year. Read More ““J. K. Rowling: A Year in the Life” (James Runcie)”

Hans Andrea of Harry Potter for Seekers web site and the Harry Potter for Seekers Yahoo Discussion Group wrote me last week about a discussion we’ve been having about The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreuz (about which exchange there will be a separate post soon). As a throwaway afterthought he asked if I’d answer a question posted at the Yahoo group:

“What would have been different in your life had Harry Potter books never existed? It does not have to be anything monumental, I mean these ARE just books, but any change will do.”

I learned later this question had been the source of much self-reflection at the Harry Potter for Grown-Ups group and it certainly brought some thoughtful responses from the Seekers at Hans’ place.

It’s that time of year, when the end meets the beginning, when by nature we will look backward to have a better idea of how to go forward. Having just posted my look backward at HogPro posts and Harry Potter events from 2007, I will close the year with an invitation and request for your reflections about the ways, if any, Harry has changed your way of thinking or seeing things. Is it deeper, decidedly different, or have you been dumbed down by all your time reading children’s book instead of Frithjof Schuon and Fyodor Dostoevski?

My life Read More ““What Difference Has Harry Made In Your Life?””

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” Read More “Best HogPro Posts of 2007: A Top 10 of Our Own”