JKR: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

[truepenny]

As promised.

Although I am probably the last person on the planet to read OotP, spoiler warnings nevertheless.


I want to start, I think, by listing off the things that I really liked about OotP, because in some ways I think it's the best of the series thus far. So.

I thought her characterization in this one was brilliant, crowned by the set-piece of Snape's memory. Since one of the things I was less fond of in the early books was the black-and-whiteness of the characterization, the shades of gray in OotP pleased me very much. And this book acknowledges (as the previous books don't so much, except for the eternal Malfoy vs. Potter--and I liked the way in this one that it's fairly clear Draco is still thinking about things from a kid's perspective. He's just as happy to follow Umbridge as Voldemort if it means he gets to bully other kids, and he's upset with Harry, in a very childlike way, for landing his father in jail. Draco pretty clearly isn't thinking yet.) just how cruel teenagers can be to each other, in the flashback, and also through Luna, as Harry has the wit to recognize at the end.

I was glad to see that Harry's habit of NEVER studying has finally turned around and bitten him on the ass.

I'm hoping she does more with the tension I noticed between Harry's stated desire to be an Auror and the fact that he seems to be a really good teacher.

I'm glad Neville got to be more heroic and less comic--and found it interesting that Neville was the one with Harry at the climax of the battle, rather than Hermione and/or Ron. Also the revelation that Voldemort made Harry and Neville who they are in some important ways simply by choosing one infant over another as his enemy.

Umbridge was of course completely OTT as a villain, but she was fun to hate, which is always a plus.

And as settings go, I think 12 Grimmauld Place may be one of my favorites.

My problem with OotP is the plot. Well, my two problems with OotP. The first, and less important tho' incredibly vexing, is the ridiculous 180-degree turn-around executed by Fudge and the Ministry. She doesn't set us up for a Road-to-Damascus moment very well, and I simply don't believe in it. I want to, but I can't. I assume (hope) that this will get recomplicated in the next book, but that won't do much for the complete implausibility of the conversion-moment here.

(Parenthetically, why is it that I was much more moved and upset by Cedric Diggory's death than Sirius Black's?)

But the big problem is Dumbledore and his lame-ass explanation. The big problem can be divided into a range of smaller problems. One, the simplest, is: why did no one bother to explain to Harry that the dreams he was having might not be true? I understand absolutely why Snape didn't--Snape is the only authority figure in the book who gets absolved, because he does hate Harry's guts, and she does (I think) do a brilliant job of showing exactly why Snape and Harry aren't communicating. But there are all sorts of other people running around who could drag Harry aside for a quiet word, and why don't they? Especially Dumbledore.

Which leads me to my second problem. Namely, that if Dumbledore's been watching Harry as closely as he says (and that bogus paternal bit completely left me cold), he would know that the worst possible way to handle Harry is to withhold information. They tried that in Prisoner of Azkaban, and it was an unmitigated disaster.

And, finally, the Big Revelation was not so much either Big or Revelatory. We already knew most of what Dumbledore's been trying to "protect" Harry from. We knew Voldemort had inadvertently shared his power with Harry, that the scar linked them, that Harry was saved by his mother's love (yadda yadda). The new piece of information, that Harry's in a kill-or-be-killed situation, did not come as a surprise. It's the logical extension (and not very far extended, at that) from the fact that Voldemort's been trying to kill Harry for, oh, FIVE books now.

So, essentially, she hung her plot on Dumbledore behaving in a needlessly stupid and counter-productive way. There were other things that irritated me (e.g., the sudden abandonment of the Fred and George plotline before Ron was forced to actually BEHAVE LIKE A PREFECT), but that was the worst. Ultimately, we had pages and pages and pages of suffering and angst--and Sirius's death just when he was starting to be an interesting character in his own right--merely because Dumbledore didn't want to upset Ickle Harry. I can understand Rowling's desire to make it clear that Dumbledore isn't perfect or infallible, but she booted it. Too much of the plot hung on this relatively trivial stupidity, and the stupidity itself was simply not in character. It's not Dumbledore's kind of mistake.

But Lupin is still alive and maybe will get more to do than just be Plot Boy next book. So I'm still reading.

Comments

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

I had to look up my notes (http://www.livejournal.com/users/melymbrosia/246303.html) to remember what I thought: this livejournal thing is damn useful. I liked pretty much the same things you did. I do think that Dumbledore's mistake is supposed to be the inverse of Sirius' (and, surprisingly, to a lesser extent Snape's): that is, Sirius and Snape are so wound up in seeing Harry as James come again that they don't see the ways in which he is still a child who needs mentorship and guidance; Dumbledore is so wound up in seeing Harry as a child who needs his (amazingly inept) protection he can't see that Harry is also a soldier in a war.

It's a very stupid mistake, but honestly I don't get the impression that most of Rowling's characters are all that bright.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I'm thinking about that intelligence issue, and it seems to me that there's a difference in the way we perceive the characters and the way we're intended to perceive the characters (Rabinowitz would call this a disjunct between the actual audience and the authorial audience). Because I agree with you that nobody in the books is terribly smart (except maybe Lupin, for whom, I admit, I have a Thing), but I think within the books themselves, we're supposed to understand that they are--stupid characters in Rowling are very carefully tagged, viz. Crabbe and Goyle.

I had a point with that, but I have no idea what it was.

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

I think it's a genre issue. Not fantasy or YA, but the very specific caricature/pantomime-type characterization Rowling does. So, yes, I agree we're meant to think that Dumbledore, say, and Hermione and Snape are supposed to be clever, and Harry is supposed to be of average intelligence, but these traits are divorced from any real evidence.

[the-red-baron.livejournal.com]

Out of curiosity - what do you think would have been Dumbledore's kind of mistake?

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Well, that's just the problem. She's set Dumbledore up so unequivocally as someone who doesn't make mistakes--the plots particularly of the first three books depend on Dumbledore being infallible and damn near omniscient--that it's hard to think of a convincing counter to it.

Misjudgment of Harry is a good one, but I think it would need extremely careful set-up to pull it off, and a much narrower kind of misjudgment.

But, then, I'm not the one writing these books. If I were, they would be something else entirely.

[peacockharpy.livejournal.com]

Check, check and check. I loved several things about the book, but Dumbledore's big confession at the end felt very flat and empty. Not to mention, JKR seems to have shifted from "our choices make us what we are" to "well, you're fated to kill or be killed, Harry," which doesn't sit well with this reader.

Snape's worst memory was my favorite part of the book, partially because it confirmed suspicions I had been harboring about James, Sirius et al. (especially considering the later incident where Sirius sends Snape to find werewolf Lupin) but also because it yanked Harry's solid, comfortable coccoon of parental worship out from under him. He ought to understand Snape a lot better now, and if Snape was using the Legilimency on Harry with any success, Snape ought to realize Harry is more like him than like his father (as Harry had a horrendous life before Hogwarts).

Lupin remains my favorite character, and I've always thought he was a better father-figure for Harry than Sirius. I hope that will get to play out in the following two books.

I'm also thoroughly impressed by JKR's gradual building up of Neville, culminating in his standing by Harry's side in the big fight at the end. The heartbreaking moment where he puts the chewing gum wrapper into his pocket, because his mother gave it to him... it's little touches like this that make me love the books.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

I am probably the last person on the planet to read OotP
No

[libskrat]

Definitely not. :)

Completely unrelated

[marith.livejournal.com]

(I've only read the first two HP books, by the way, so you're still further from the last person. Everyone tells me subsequent books are better, but I'm in no great hurry to find out.)

diony has been reading Amanda Cross mysteries, and showed me a quote the other day which leaped off the page saying "truepenny!"

"Our examinations are all wrong. In Sweden, the whole thing is done what I call properly. There's a professor who attacks the work, a professor who defends it, and a third who makes humorous remarks, which of course we are all dying to do, but can never do properly in this country. Then when it's over the candidate gives a ball, white tie and long dresses. I'm thinking of emigrating."
(from _Poetic Justice_)

I agree with diony that the dialogue is reminiscent of _Tam Lin_ in being too...literary? British? for 1970s quasi-Cornell. But the committee sounds more fun than yours. :)