LH, I rather liked the scene in the first movie where they were talking about what Harry’s parents preferred in their wands. I thought the whole thing was a phallic reference on the part of Rowling.

“Take your wand firmly in the palm of your hand, and give it a flick of your wrist- something magical will come out the end.”

Iargued much the same about Shakespeare at A level- WS was churning these things out, he probably didn’t analyse things to that degree.  I believe some ‘experts’ will say thats his genius- he didn’t have to, he knew instinctively.

Hey now, arguing about this stuff is the only joy that mediocre writers (like me) had in English class!  Don’t suck all the fun out of it!  Spoilsport… 

Iargued much the same about Shakespeare at A level- WS was churning these things out, he probably didn’t analyse things to that degree.  I believe some ‘experts’ will say thats his genius- he didn’t have to, he knew instinctively.  We could always ask Martha and the Dr

That’s a hoot!

It is. I wish I had a copy…

Goethe’s ghost agrees to help out a hapless student—little does he suspect. When asked about some character, he replies “oh, he’s just a fool”, only to be told in excruciating detail what the throw-away character stands for. In the minds of people making a career out of over-interpreting his work, that is.

There was a delightful play on German TV years ago where Goethe’s ghost fails a verbal exam about his own work…

That’s a hoot!  Can you just imagine what poor Shakespeare would go through?  Aiyee.  (‘Course, he’d probably laugh his @$$ off at Star Trek VI:  “You have never experienced Shakespeare until you have read him in the original Klingon.”  Well, *I* laughed my @$$ loose—but, then, I’m a dork that way…)

The reverse can also be true, though.

People have probably interpreted all kinds of shit into characters the author never gave a second thought. There was a delightful play on German TV years ago where Goethe’s ghost fails a verbal exam about his own work…

I don’t think that it would have been an issue if WB’s scriptwriters hadn’t taken liberties with the material.  Like Melissa Etheridge didn’t out herself until a reporter printed something about a “boyfriend” and she had to correct the misinterpretation of what she had said about her partner. 

I agree with Julian & Les:  You live with these characters so long that what shows up in the books is only a fraction of their personality/backstory.  Look at all the stuff that didn’t make it into the Lord of the Rings and had to be teased out of notes by Christopher Tolkien and Guy Gavriel Kay.  And, too, JRR and Edith Tolkien’s tombstones bear the inscriptions “Beren” and “Luthien”.  Both characters were sooooo incidental to the Hobbit and LotR we know.  But that’s the part that was important to them. 

Enough armchair psychoanalysis from me for one day, at any rate…

LH you seem to have a certain personal dislike for Harry Potter/Rowling. May I ask why? I’m not criticizing- I feel the same way about Eragon and Narnia. Just curious.

Truth is a lot of authors come up with complete biographies for their primary characters filled with material that may never see the light of day in any novel, but which are important in remembering who those people are as the author writes over the years.

I still entertain the idea of writing a novel someday and when I get the itch to work on one I usually start by writing down short bios of the primary characters. I’ve written hundreds of them over the years, but have yet to turn any of it into a novel.