Lewis CCA Paper

I am currently writing my CCA paper. I forget what the assigned topic is, exactly…something about the morality and religion of Tolkein or Lewis. I’m just writing what I want to, and figuring it will manage to touch upon the necessary things. (It’s sort of hard to talk about Lewis without mentioning religion...)

Some of the lectures were OK, some were a bit boring, and apparently one was rather trite. But there were also two or three incredible ones. Like Dr. Jerry Root's, which I’m taking most of my required quotes from. It's got a really stupid title – “C.S. Lewis as an Apologist” (which isn’t what the thing was about at all). And it doesn’t have the speaker’s digression into coruscating sunrises, or stars, or the braided rings of Saturn, or what-if worlds where the sun has only risen once. But it does have the parts about iconoclastic reality, and problems with transposing the infinite into the finite, and master’s metaphors vs. pupil’s metaphors, and fiction helping to solve the general/particular tension.

And my new favorite Lewis quote: “For this end I made your senses and for this end your imagination, that you might see My face and live.” (The Pilgrim’s Regress)

And some more new favorites:

By Lewis:

• “When [a given] metaphor is our only method or reaching a given idea at all, there our thinking is limited by metaphor so long as we retain the metaphor; and when the metaphor becomes fossilized, our ‘thinking;’ is not thinking at all.” (Selected Literary Essays)
  
  
• “The man who is contented to be only himself, and therefore less as self, is in a prison. My own eyes are not enough for me; I will see through those others. Reality, even seen through the eyes of many, is not enough. I will see what other have invented. Even the eyes of all humanity are not enough. I regret that the brutes cannot write books.” (An Experiment in Criticism).

And one by Janet Soskice:
“Our concern is with conceptual possibility rather than proof, and with a demonstration that we may justly claim to speak about God without claiming to define him.” (Metaphor and Religious Language.)

And one by Robert Browning:
“Welcome each rebuff that turns earth’s smoothness rough.”

And a couple by Dr. Root:

• “Fiction, because it is not expected to give hard definitions, is less likely to tempt the reader into thinking its world is complete or full understood. Fiction is able to describe without eliminating all ambiguities. In fact, often it is a rest with a degree of ambiguity.”
  
  
• “Without respect for criticism, faith traditions (and we might add apologetic methods) will tend to ossify and become unresponsive to the way things are.”
  
  
• “All understanding is approximate, and one must constantly be seeking better and better approximations.”
  
  
• “Lewis writes, often enough in his books, that Reality is Iconoclastic. And iconoclast breaks idols. As Lewis uses the phrase, he writes of God, as the iconoclast who seeks to break all false notions we may have of Him. One may pick up a new image of God: after reading a book; after having a late night discussion with a friend; after hearing a lecture or a sermon. These images may be particularly helpful in a given moment for putting many pieces of a very complex puzzle in place. But, if we hold onto these images too tightly, helpful as they might have been, they compete against one’s gaining a growing image of God. The image once helpful now becomes and idol. God, in is mercy, kicks out the walls of any temples built for him, because He wants to give to each more of Himself.”
  
  If reality is iconoclastic, and more complex than any individual might naturally grasp, it stands to reason that understanding will be enhanced in the context of community where opposition is encouraged, and perspective widened by dialectic association with others….”
  
  
• “Lewis himself is quick to remind his readers in many, many places that all human system, paradigms, models, and so forth are destined to become ‘discarded images’.”
  
  
• "In the Great Divorce, George MacDonald appears as a character, and declares ‘Ye cannot know eternal reality by definition.’ The word definition literally means ‘of the finite.’ We define things by virtue of their limitation -- they can be distinguished from other things –- and their function. In other worlds, for a thing to be defined it must be small enough to wrap words around it. In light of this, how can anyone speak of the Infinite? Even Jesus, in the Gospels, preaching about the Kingdom of God, says, ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is like...’ – he resorts to simile, metaphor, figures of speech, parable and so forth."

Squee.

If all the professors at Wheaton were like this, I would have killed to have gone there. They aren't, which is one of the reason's I'm glad I ended up here at Hillsdale instead.

Brain is going into giddy overload at the moment. Partly because I finally got the transcript, partly because it’s dark and chilled and raining outside (and I want to go splash in puddles and lie down in the wet grass), partly because people up here are cool, and partly because I’m going to my first ever formal dance thing tomorrow.

Late Night Graveyard Conversations

Some useful things learned with Laura, Tiffany, Matthew, and Aaron tonight/last night:

• Cemetaries at night are beautiful.
  
  
• Order of the Stick is near-universally applicable.
  
  
• The existence of the word "zebroid" has been existentially proven. Sort of.
  
  
• If the ancient philosophers had known about Einstein, they would have envisioned God as hyperspace. Or space bent in on itself. Not a sphere.
  
  
• The honey glaze for ham can be used to penetrate some kinds of biological-weapons-defense materials.
  
  
• If you're stalking a deer, and you step on a twig, you should gobble like a turkey. It will confuse them, and they'll come back to check the thing out.
  
  
• We won't run out of energy, saith Matthew. But another apocalyptic event is very likely. Eventually.
  
  
• Apocalypses are like anti-christs. Even now there are many little ones among us.
  
  
• If your tradition is not to have a tradition, would you have to refuse to have a tradition in order to be traditional?
  
  
• You can see the International Space Station at night if the sky is clear enough.
  
  
• Matthew and Aaron could invent a killer "Biblical RPG":
  
  Player A: "Hey -- my conversion roll failed!"
  Player B: "You must be an Arminian, man. It's not you that does it -- it's the Holy Spirit!"

And finally...

• Envisioning a circling sphere of stars, turning around a fixed earth, gives one type of awe. Envisioning the vastness of space, with blinding motion and movement and scattered stars, gives a wholly other kind.
  
  And because Lewis can express things so much more poetically and articulately than I can:
  
  "Be comforted, small immortals. You are not the voice that all things utter, nor is there eternal silence in the places where you cannot come. No feet have walked, not shall, on the ice of Glund; no eye looked up from beneath the Ring of Lurga, and Iron-plain in Neruval is chaste and empty. Yet it is not for nothing that the gods walk ceaselessly around the fields of Arbol. Blessed be He!"
  
  "[Even] the Dust itself which is scattered so rare in Heaven, whereof all worlds, and the bodies that are not worlds, are made, is at the center. It waits not till created eyes have seen it or hands handled it, to be in itself a strength and splendor of Maleldil. Only the least part has served, or ever shall, a beast, a man, or a god. But always, and beyond all distances, before they came and after they are gone and where they never come, it is what it is and utters the heart of the Holy One with its own voice. It is farthest from Him of all things, for it has no life, nor sense, nor reason;it is nearest to Him of all things for without intervening soul, as sparks fly out of fire, He utters in each grain of it the unmixed image of His energy. Each grain, it if spoke, would say, I am at the center, for me all things were made. Let no mouth open to gainsay it. Blessed be He!"
  
  (from Perelandra)

Benzing Dorm Life

I officially recant. Benzing Dorm (or my hall of it, at least), is an awesome place. If I stay at Hillsdale another semester, I'd probably want to keep living here. It's one whacked out, weird, and rather goofed up place, but still awesome.

To save 1000 words (or at least 150), here is a lovely diagram of my dorm to start things off.



Claro?

Now, I can understand why people wouldn't want to live here, and why there were reactions last semester of "Eww! Benzing? That's the LAST dorm I'd ever choose to live in!" when I mentioned it. I hear you guys, and yeah, that was my basic impression of the place, too.

It is, I think, still my general impression of the second and third floors -- from what I can see of them, I still wouldn't want to live there. The second floor, because it's mostly athletes and I'm not an athlete. And the third floor because...well, I really don't know. Because it feels like McIntyre (my freshman year dorm)? Sorry for having no coherent reason; I just wouldn't want to live there. Although it is fun to visit. And it has the Narnia Club headquarters!

Now...the 1st floor. I can definitely understand people not wanting to live here, too. Reasons would generally focus on, but not necessarily be limited to...

• noise
  
  
• language used by some of the girls (crap, shit, fuck, ass, double entendres, etc. etc. etc.)
  
  
• The choice of 'Nigel' as a door decoration

And maybe a few other things that are slipping my mind.

I probably should have been traumatized by my first week there. But my brain ended up being pretty one-track: "Look! People! Yay! Talk!"

With the end result that I discovered a couple other things about this hall:

• Girls who know how to play Risk. ("Ha! The Fascist Confederates of Southern Asia will never surrender to the Greenpeace Alliance!")
  
  
• Classics majors.
  
  
• People writing epic poems.
  
  
• Noise.
  
  
• A good chunk of the anime club.
  
  
• Intermittent hand to hand combat with cardboard poster tubes, mineral water, and Sharpie pens. Usually sparked by some comment about the civil war.
  
  
• Staying up late.
  
  
• Air conditioning.
  
  
• Our hall's unofficial referendum on Benzing identity: "They're trying to make us a party dorm this year, and we DON'T want that. But it's not like we want to be Mauck, either."
  
  
• Cool RAs. Maybe it's just the "let's be friendly and positively reinforcive" training that they apparently switched to, but in either case, I actually know who my RAs are this year, and like hanging out in their rooms.
  
  
• Some really neat people I only knew in passing last year (Paula, Christine)
  
  
• Tons of neat people I'd never even have said "hi" to otherwise. (Megan, Suzanne, Kristi, Kirsten, Avril, Ellyn, Amy, Roseli...)

However cliched it sounds, and however much grief I'm going to get from my fellow Hillsdalians for saying this, I pretty much agree with one of Kate's RA profile answers. The best reason to live in Benzing is the diversity. Or perhaps more accurately, the diverse range of people who are happy and willing to talk with one another. At least on floor 1.

Life would be a lot poorer in 1st Floor Benzing without a Kristi or Megan or Christine or Kirsten or Roseli...or even an Avril. Maybe a bit more calm, or unified, or quiet, or easy...but nowhere near as fascinating. Or as exciting and challenging and fun. I hang out with fairly like-minded people all day, which is awesome-cool in its own right. Let me have my awesome-cool counterbalance as well.

Literature Papers and "Christian Life Application" Clauses

Some thoughts on literature essays...rather disorganized, and will probably stay that way for a while.

I went off on a bit of tangent typing out a reply to an email from back home; we're in the middle of looking for a new school for my sibling(s), and my Mom wanted a quick summary of what my high school Brit Lit class was like, so we could compare curricula.

Correspondence back and forth included this line:

As far as the writing goes, the students write a substantial number of papers, essays, some research work on various issues in the works, authors, and developments of British Literature itself. Most of the papers have some sort of "Christian life application" element to them, from the topics and themes we discussed in the literature.

Now. One thing I appreciated about Dr. Klucking, my 12th grade teacher, was that she didn't make us tack on a Christian Life Application to our papers, or sum everything up in some grand conclusion about how this book illustrated a profound scriptural truth. Lots of people did do that, but it wasn't mandatory. I could usually get away with talking about how certain beliefs the author had explained the actions/views taken by various characters in the work. Which is honestly still about all I'm comfortable doing -- if the author isn't making some grand point about the Christian life, I'd rather just say "look at the incredible, utterly believable character development! The interior monologues illustrate a progression from sanity to crippling skepticism -- and one that is as relentlessly inescapable as it is chilling." Or maybe, "doh -- this other book has an awesome use of the Faustian archetype. And that is one of the main reasons that this character and his dilemma resonates with us. This tension of "forbidden knowledge" has been a staple of Western literature since the beginning. Literally -- just look at Genesis. And Prometheus too, while you're at it. And Pandora. And of course Faust... :-)."

They're literature papers -- CS Lewis didn't go off giving gospel-summary life-application-messages in his introduction to Paradise Lost.

Last year, we had some speaker come in and give a talk about literature...though I didn't agree with his conclusion (along the lines of "we shouldn't analyze the 'lessons' of literature at all; we should rather experience it as we do music -- for its form and beauty"), I think he did have more than half a point. And I especially liked how he described literature as a window into the human soul, into human creativity -- sometimes right, sometimes wrong, sometimes inspired, sometimes confused, sometimes misguided, but either way telling us something about people and the author and part of life. And a lot of the time, when I'm reading something, I just want to say, "Wow. That's incredible language, incredible imagery, incredible effect, incredible characterization, and an incredibly fundamental human tension and dilemma ... Look at it. It's a masterpiece. It's beautiful." Or as Donahough (or whatever his name was) put it -- "Dear God! To live in a world where such perceptions are possible!"

And I do not want to say -- (picking the first thing off the top of my head) -- "Hester Pryne was a bad person, according to Bible passages A, B, C, D, E, F, and G."

DIEDIEDIEDIEDIE!!!! What sort of literature paper is that? Context (for starters)! Why are you abstracting the thing from its context? Who was Hawthorne? What sort of audience and culture was he writing to? What was he trying to say with this story? What, precisely, was Puritanism? What would have been 1600-Massachusetts-Puritain-people's verdict on Hester? Then, what parts of this worldview if Hawthorne criticizing? What parts does he appear to be supporting? What does the symbolism, etc. of this story imply? Does Hawthorne show inconsistency in how he portrays these things? And forget Puritanism for a second -- what sorts of literary characters have prefigured the Hester-character?

I CAN write a paper on how Hester Pryne was a bad and unrepentant person according to Bible passages A, B, C, and D -- but I could pretty much only do it by discussing Hawthorne, Puritan culture, and Christian theology, Christian tradition, and what Hawthorne was saying about all of it -- how he was consistent/inconsistent, or giving a valid criticism/giving an invalid criticism, or hitting close to the mark/missing the point. And maybe throw philosophy and Victorian culture into the mix as well. If Hester's Pryne's a bad person, there'll be more to show for it than Bible passages A, B, C, and D -- we should be able to find a good bit of universal human experience on this side, and plenty of archetypes, and a rooted and consistent ethical system, and lots of other cool stuff like that.

Plus, the Scarlet letter isn't a (just) biography or moral proposition -- it's a work of literature, a piece of art, a glimpse into a creator's mind and thoughts and imagination. And any good literature essay will treat it like that, and not like a dead and cold moral essay, and not like a candidate for theological vivisection.

//...and she descends from her soapbox. ;-)//

Though I still want to write my "There is no fear in love, for perfect love casteth out fear" paper on 1984 someday.

Robert Jordan

Well -- I have finally read Robert Jordan. More specifically, I have read The Eye of the World, the first book of the Wheel of Time series.

According to the 20+ review snippets on the cover, Jordan is apparently the next Tolkien, and this series is The Great Fantasy Epic of Our Time. I'm figuring it's pretty safe to assume this is mostly hyperbole. Every fantasy author people like tends to be proclaimed the Next Tolkien. The overwhelming concurrence of the reviewers and readers on this point, however, is a bit unnerving. Especially given the utter banality of this book.

Quite honestly, I hated it. I thought it was predictable, boring, laughable, and way to long. I thought the prose was thick, heavy, dry, and sleep-inducing. It took me a week to sludge through his 800-odd pages, and there is no way I want to repeat that experience a dozen more times.

Does this mean it is a bad and terrible book? No. It does not. Not necessarily, at least. I have said some of those same things after reading Sense and Sensibility, The Brothers Karamazov, The Divine Comedy, and even The Lord of the Rings. Call me a heretic, apostate, blah blah blah -- I still never want to read those books again.

So I'm a bit wary of going after Jordan. I know that once there's a gut-reaction dislike of a book or movie, it's quite easy to find myriad reasons why it's so terrible. And I know that once I have a gut-level liking for a book or movie, I'm very good at gleefully ignoring its faults. Things that would arouse mocking laughter and criticism in one case get shrugged off in another. (I'm thinking here of the reactions I've seen to everything from A Tale of Two Cities to The Scarlet Letter to Oedipus Rex to Underworld to Star Trek to Firefly to Harry Potter to CS Lewis to Pullman to GRR Martin to GG Kay). Shucks...I could tear and nitpick the Star Wars original trilogy to pieces if I wanted to. But I don't want to. I tell people to get a life. "It's a rollicking fun story; just roll with plot holes and forget about the metaphysical ramifications."

On the other hand, I'm still scratching my head over Jordan. What on earth did I miss? Why are people so crazy about him? I can understand the attraction of Jane Austen, The Lord of the Rings, the Divine Comedy, and Russian writers, even though I can't stand to read any of them. I can agree that those books contain elements that are worthwhile, enjoyable, or thought-provoking. I can appreciate the artistry that went into that literature. I can agree that I am something of a blockhead for being incapable of appreciating it. But I CANNOT understand this attraction to Jordan. Not liking Jane Austen feels akin to saying, "I don't like to eat gourmet Chicken-spinach casserole." Not liking Jordan feels akin to saying, "I don't like Coke."

Or, looked at from another angle...I appreciated the fact that I could recommend The Eye of the World to my friends and sisters if I wanted to. There's no sex (graphic or otherwise) in it, and I don't think any horridly terrible language or violence, either. But I didn't like the fact that there was no reason to bother recommending it. Was there any outstanding prose and description, like in Kay? Was there any incredible plotlining and characterization, like in Martin? Was there any knockout satire and worldbuilding, like in Fforde? I've a limited amount of time on my hands, here...why should I sludge through 800 pages of pure mediocrity when there's better stuff out there?

Sure...there were occasionally things I enjoyed. I rather liked the way Jordan played with the concept of cyclical history. Perrin turning into a wolfman was awesome. I liked watching Mat and Rand having to live as apprentice gleemen. But other than that, I didn't find much of interest. There's a Dark One bound by the Creator in the Mountains of Dhoom (honestly -- they're CALLED that) with his Trollocs and wraith-things, intent upon taking over the world. There's a farmboy who's actually heir to a some ancient bloodlines, a cool sword, and a Prophecy. He and a party of companions (ax-wielding blacksmith boy, archer boy, bard, warrior, magic-wielding lady, two more magically inclined girls) flee the village pursued by the Dark One's minions. They get separated, run into lots of trouble, finally get back together (the bard is replaced by an animal-thing), finish reaching the spot where a semi-final showdown will occur, and defeat the Dark One when the farmboy calls on heretofore unused magical ability. There's some politicking and political discontent going on in the world, and some vigilante groups, some gypsies, and the magic-wielding Aes Sedai who have their own purposes in mind.

It's not bad, per se. Conceivably, it might have been a cool book. Some of it has definite potential...the "group gets scattered" part, or the "naive farmboys hit outside world" theme, or the "politicking/divisions/ulterior purposes" idea. Shucks -- even Dark Lords, Chosen Ones, and Quests (though rather overdone by now, and a bit of a turnoff for me) have been executed well. But compared to other writers, Jordan manages these poorly.

Por ejemplo...Tolkien also separated his guys. Each group then went and did crucial things that united nations of good guys and/or set up the bad guys. When the storm broke, evil got defeated. Everyone was reunited in a denumount. The End. Where did Jordan miss the "scattered groups do important things on an international level to unify the factions against the looming threat before at last being reunited" idea? Do I have to read the next nine TWELVE books to get to that part of the story? I wonder...do they get separated again, and reuinited again, in each book? Or does Jordan finally leave them alone, like he should have in the first place?

Somewhat related to this...did Jordan also miss the "scattered groups get caught up in the international/national troubles and have to fend for themselves" idea? Politicking and vigilantes and groups of people at cross-purposes with one another are cool. Wars with multiple contesting factions, focused on their own very troubles, while shadows of deeply evil things loom on the horizon(s)... THAT is awesomely cool. But Jordan is no Martin, any more than he is a Tolkien. When do run-ins with these factions/cultures/politicking ever cause deep and lasting changes to the character's life-purposes, character, and goals? Aside from Perrin, who becomes a wolfman tied into the rebirth of legendary magic, everyone seems to glide through any contact with the outside world unscathed. Why not just teleport them to the Eye, give them a few lectures on magic, and have done with it? With all the other magic pulled out of thin air when it's convenient (applications of elemental magic, the passageways, the green man, Rand), WHY NOT throw in teleportation?

Final verdict? I guess it's OK fantasy. But with Martin-Kay-Pullman-Lewis-Tolkien (and maybe Robin Hobb or Stephen Brust, too) out there, what makes you think I'd even bother with Jordan? Perhaps his books do get better. But after the first one, I'm not inclined to give him another chance.

Half-Blood Prince, part 2

Okay...Snape. Again: I've done a lousy job at predicting her red herrings, even when I got in trouble for reading the books when I was 3/5 of the way through Prisoner of Azkaban, and had 18 months to guess the ending. My grand prediction was that Sirius was trying to kill Lupin. Ha!

Here goes nothing; spoilery stuff galore below.

Basic Option 1: Snape is good. (Sort of).
This was my initial reaction. Rowling is pulling her favorite red herring again, and working really hard to make us fall for it this time. But it's still a red herring.

I can't exactly say that Snape is good. He's not. He's a bitter, cruel, vicious, messed up man, with a history of terrible acts...who somehow managed to come up on the right side of things. Probably only because of Dumbledore's friendship.

When has Dumbledore ever been this drastically wrong about a person's character? He may screw up in some things (like going after a locket that isn't there, like not telling Harry the prophecy, like underestimating Draco's ability to get Death Eaters into Hogwarts), but when it comes down to seeing a person's heart, he's always judged rightly. I'm with Lupin. If Dumbledore trusts him, I do too.

The Unbreakable Vow caused a lot of problems. Snape agreed to it, probably because he was on the spot, had to make a split-second decision, and goofed up. Bellatrix was calling his bluff. Narcissa was pleading with him to save her son. And perhaps Snape wasn't expecting the third clause of the Vow. Though it's possible that he had already talked to Dumbledore about Voldemort's plan, and they'd agreed that Snape should kill him (Dumbledore) if Voldemort demanded it.

Anyhow -- once the Vow was in place, it's only a matter of time. Once it was evident that Draco would not be able to kill Dumbledore, someone had to die. If Snape refused, then Snape would die. If Snape fulfilled the vow, then Dumbledore would die. Moreover -- and I may be wrong on this -- I'm pretty sure that if Draco failed and another Death Eater killed Dumbledore, then Snape would die. It's a no-win situation. Once the Vow was in place, the best anyone could do was postpone the time of confrontation with Draco. (The necklace and gin, I believe, did not have enough "Draco is going to fail"-ness to them to force the situation. The confrontation in the tower, on the other hand, did).

I don't know if Snape told Dumbledore the whole story of the Vow. My first thought was that he did, and that Dumbledore made a pragmatic command decision about who had to die. The argument between Snape and Dumbledore arose because Snape didn't like Dumbledore's call on this matter. Then up in the tower, Dumbledore pleaded with Snape not to mess up the plan. However, it's not clear at all from the book that Snape informed Dumbledore about the depth of the mess he was in. I rather like the idea of things getting out of hand in the tower -- of Dumbledore underestimating Draco, not expecting Death Eaters, not knowing the extent of Snape's dilemma. I can't see him making the promises to Draco that he did, unless he expected to survive a bit longer.

Now...there's "revulsion and hatred" on Snape's face as he kills Dumbledore. Interesting choice of words:

Hating himself, repulsed by what he was doing, Harry forced the goblet back toward Dumbledore's mouth and tipped it, so that Dumbledore drank the remainder of the potion inside (571).

Snape gazed for a moment at Dumbledore, and there was revulsion and hatred etched in the harsh lines of his face" (595).

All in all...people made some big mistakes. Bad things happened. Sacrifices had to be made. But all this is setting the stage for Voldemort's defeat. First, we have the classic mentor-death, showing Harry that he has to learn to battle and survive on his own. Secondly, the good guys now have a person deep within Voldemort's trust and councils. We're looking at the first part of a longer story. HP6 is putting the pieces in place, setting us up for something like a "Snape is good" twist in HP7, just like the first half of HP1 set us up for the "Snape is good" twist in its second half.

A final consideration: Rowling's world would lose a whole lot of subtlety, and a whole lot of gray, if every guy that Harry thought was evil was actually evil. Or if every guy who looked evil was pure evil. I stayed with the series because, in book 1, Snape turned out to be the "good guy."

Basic Option 2: Snape is evil.
I need to go back and read the series from this perspective. Because, by golly, it just might be right. At first I thought, "No way! Rowling's world doesn't work like that! Dumbledore wouldn't be that incompetent! He's freaking demi-omniscient! He always manages to fix things, and he always knows what to do!"

But if Dumbledore is more fallible than we assumed, it's gloriously, tragically inevitable. The whole series has been leading up to a moment like this -- a moment when Dumbledore for once bets wrong. When Harry realizes that not even Dumbledore had everything under control, or had all the answers, or was without a major failing. Snape's evilness works. It's an inescapable necessity. It's a foreshadowed tragedy. It makes an awesome-cool story.

Dumbledore, who usually gets this sort of thing right, eventually makes a misjudgment of a person's character. There have been foreshadowings of his fallibility (see above; see Order of the Phoenix; etc). Other teachers mention that he can be too trusting -- that it has always been his weakness. Dumbledore acknowledges his potential to make catastrophic mistakes.

"But as I have already proven to you, I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being -- forgive me -- rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger" (197).

And he does make a huge one, which costs him his life, and that of several other people, too (the murders at the beginning of the book, at the very least).

HP6 isn't meant to be a set-up for book 7, any more than 5 was a set-up for 6. This volume has reached an end and a resolution. The mystery has been solved; the answer had been revealed. This page of the drama -- a tragic one -- has been completed. It's time to move on, making the best of the new situation.

This is the way the books have always ended...a twist that has a ring of finality. The final chapters are always a revelation of the true nature of things. In Philosopher's Stone we realize that Quirrel is evil, and that Snape is innocent (at least of that particular crime). In Chamber of Secrets, we realize that Riddle is evil, and that Hagrid is innocent. In Prisoner of Azkaban, we realize that it's actually Pettigrew who is evil, and that Sirius is innocent. In Goblet of Fire, we realize that Crouch the evil and guilty man. In Order of the Phoenix, there's no 'villain' to find, per se. But there is the matter of Sirius's death. Despite some ambiguity, it was evidently real and final, just like Dumbledore & Co. said. There's no loose ends; he's not coming back. (His non-return is what convinced me of the finality of Rowling's conclusions. Even if there seems be wiggle room, there actually isn't). So happens in Half-Blood Prince? It is revealed that 1) Snape is actually evil, and 2)Dumbledore is dead. Given the finality of each of the previous book's revelations, we should assume that these things are what they appear to be.

I don't like it. I don't want Harry to be right about Snape. But if HP6 follows the pattern of books 1 - 5, Evil!Snape is the way Rowling wants her world to be. I can be OK with that (if not overly thrilled); a Dumbledore-tragedy plot arc is still quite cool. Moreover, while I may mourn the state of the series as a whole, Evil!Snape sure makes book 6 a lot more gripping and chilling than Good!Snape.

Final consideration for this side: Voldemort is "the most accomplished Legilimens the world has ever seen." Snape might be very powerful in Occlumency...but I have a lot of trouble believing he's that powerful.

In Conclusion...
Basically (QuickSummary!): If this is a book complete in itself, following the pattern of books 1-5, then Snape is evil. If this book is "part 1 of 2," then Snape is probably good.

I'm aware there's probably an Option 3: "Snape is on his own side." I'll have to think about it, but I don't find this too plausible. Everyone is pretty much ends up either helping Voldemort ("evil") or not helping him ("good"). Snape is now either a Death Eater or Fake Death Eater. I'm sure plenty of DE's are allied with Voldemort for their own ulterior purposes or their own survival...and that doesn't make them merely "on their own side."

My bet is currently on Good!Snape...after I wrote this, I found that Rowling said she considers this book a "part 1 of 2." However, Evil!Snape makes book 6 a lot more interesting, and should be a pretty fun framework to use when re-reading the series. Also, I’ll probably read book 7 using the Evil!Snape template. Gleefully going along with a red herring can be fun. 1) If he’s good, I’ll be pleasantly surprised. 2) If he’s evil, then he’s evil. 3) If he’s evil and I’m betting on good, it’ll be a bit of a letdown and disappointment. Sort of like realizing that Sirius’s death was a settled issue.

Half-Blood Prince, part 1

I usually wait until books show up on the library shelves....but I gave in this time and actually put Half-Blood Prince on hold at the library. Here follow some initial reactions...basically, everything except a prediction on Snape.

Spoilers for certain.

1. It's generally not a good idea to start a book with a punctuation error. My 12 year old sister, whose writing I'm correcting this summer, knows better than to let this pass:

It was nearing midnight and the Prime Minister was sitting alone in his office...

2. Holy Moses -- the potion of Deus ex Machina! And I thought Veritaserum was bad! ::collapses on the floor in uncontrollable gut-wrenching laughter::

I'm considering letting it pass, because Harry Potter seems like a semi-absurd world. (If Fforde had included Felix Felicis in his books, I'd have thought it was a stroke of genius). I usually don't care about absurdities and plot holes in the HP world. Still, this honestly seems like a bit of extraordinarily lazy plotting. Along the lines of "Oops! Some really improbable cooincidences have to occur! And I don't have time to think up a plausible chain of events!" The Deus ex Machina potion also brings up the retroactive effect problem again. Potions as super-powerful as this ought to have had a huge impact on the wizarding world. Their effect should have shown up before book 6, like Polyjuice potion did. There should be some awesome-solid reasons why they aren't used all the time (at least by Voldemort).

The same probably goes for Unbreakable Vows, but those at least didn't send me into fits of giggles.

3. Do I care who is "snogging" whom? NO!

Maybe it's just because I've never been on a single date, and never had a "boyfriend". Maybe it's because I've had a grand total of ONE crush in my entire life. (Well -- okay. TWO. Once you've learned to identify them, they can't ambush you anymore. You can shove them in a cage and laugh at them until they die).

I liked Bill and Fleur. I thought the whole thing was sweet, funny, fitting, and believable. But everyone else? Why oh why did we have to spend 30% of the book worried about these kids' childish 'romantic' squabbles? Was there honestly ANY doubt that Ginny and Harry would end up together? Or Ron with Herminone? You could see it coming from HP2. I was thrown off by Viktor and Cho in HP4; those relationships actually raised some doubt in my mind about the direction Rowling was going to take her characters. The pairs matched believably, and stayed together for a whole book. But this time around? Lavender Brown, Dean, and every other love interest were so obviously unfitting and short-lived it wasn't even funny. Forgive me if my eyes skipped whole pages.

I'm rather confunded by Tonks/Lupin as well. I guess it works, but I would have never seen if coming. Lots of other people seem to share this sentiment, so I'm going to assume my confusion isn't just due to not having read the books for two years.

4. Tentative theory...I'm wondering if the Harry Potter books could be considered an example of a (perhaps unsuccessful) Cerebus Syndrome. The stretchings of plot that work in a lightheard boarding school/whodunit/parodical world might not prove workable once things start getting more serious and dramatic. The same might also be said for the moral framework of the world.

Then again, I've probably just read way to much meta, which uber-analyzes everything and tends to make it more serious than it is.

5. Tom Riddle is an awesome villain. He's smart, he's evil, he's manipulative, he's persuasive. I like skilled and intelligent villains.

6. Harry and Co. aren't very nice to the lower-schoolers. I forgave them for any inconsideration in HP5 -- but they're 16 now, and you'd think they'd grown up a bit. Especially since Ron and Hermione are both prefects now.

7. The commentators at the Quiddich games are horrible. It's another thing I never noticed when the books had a lighter tone. If they're going to be this biased, they need to rotate commentators. Luna was probably the only close-to-objective one.

8. Snape is smart. He's talented. He's a freaking prodigy and genius. Has no one else noticed this? He practically rewrites the potions system. He's got some uber-occlumentic abilities. He invents spells and hexes. He's managed to double-face his way -- to either Dumbledore or Voldemort -- for years. Double bonus points if it's Voldemort ("the most accomplished Legilimens the world has ever seen"). And who does Dumbledore go to when really nasty stuff needs to be healed and fixed? The last time we saw people of this caliber were Voldemort and Dumbledore. I honestly can't think of another current wizard who comes close.

If you were this good, and people didn't recognize and respect it, wouldn't you be a bit bitter, too?


When I finally get around to it, Part 2 should be on Evil!Snape vs. Good!Snape. Rowling threw me for a loop on this one -- I don't know what to bet on at the moment, and the more I look at it, the more confused I get. I'm also notoriously bad at predicting the endings to her books, so you'll be better off going with whatever conclusion I don't reach.

George R. R. Martin and "A Feast for Crows"

//Quick-fix Edit as of 1/03/06: Martin has officially lost his plot in a morass of sex and violence. Revised verdict: NOT recommended to anyone. There's better books out there. Read those. Yes, I'll back this up with a three-point persuasive essay if you want to call me out on it.//END EDIT

Ok. I've done some minor editing to this to make the content more understandable to the uninitiated. :-)

A Brief Intro
Here is George R. R. Martin's web site. He's currently writing a fantasy series entitled A Song of Ice and Fire.

Here is a spoiler-free Wikipedia page that introduces this series. I can't vouch for the spoiler-freeness of any pages connected to this one, but this particular page is nice and bland, and gives a good feel for his worldbuilding.

The Song of Ice and Fire books have phenomonal plotlining and characterization. Martin has subplots upon subplots that interweave and connect. He manages to make you side with whichever character currently has the PoV. (Except for Theon Greyjoy. I despise Theon, and hope he dies a terrible, horrible, grusome death. It would be poetic justice to the nth degree). It is very likely that Theon will meet said death, because Martin is not nice to his chracters. Bad guys die, good guys die, minor characters die, main characters die. Multi-faceted civil wars are tearing apart the kingdom(s) of Westeros, and worse things lurk around the corner.

I wish I could recommend these books to everyone I know; again, the plotting and characterization are incredible. But his stuff would also be rated R (or M, or whatever the rating is) for violence, language, and sex. Maybe higher. There's portions of these books that I skip.

Some thoughts on A Feast for Crows
Now that all the stuff up there is out of the way...

There's a Cersei chapter up! I'm probably the last to hear about this, but I'm going to shout about it anyway. First because it's Cersei. Martin's finally made her a PoV character...and darn it, I think he's almost pulled another Jaimie. Secondly, this is a much more recommendable chapter than the Theon one that was up the last time time I checked. Now, even though the chapter pretty much spoils the series so far, I won't have to worry so much about people I know hearing me mention "Martin" and running across one of his (IMO) worst chunks of writing.

Here's the link -- though if you haven't been reading A Song of Ice and Fire, be aware that it obviously contains really big spoilers for the first three books in the series.

I'm probably the last to hear about this announcement, too.

::sigh:: Seven books, now, is it? Weren't there only supposed to be four when he started this series? I've every confidence in Martin as a writer, but here's hoping that he doesn't go Robert Jordon on us. And I do find myself among the readers disappointed that they won't get their favorite characters in A Feast for Crows. With maybe one or two exceptions, every character I really like is now in the North or East.

The splitting up of the book like this also seems to throw the balance of the series out of whack. There's always been a tension to the books. On one hand, you have the murderous, backstabbing struggle for the Iron Throne that's plunged just about every house into war with one another. This is very bad, and very terrible, and lots of horribly cool things happen in the middle of all of it. But on the other hand, there's the northern and eastern chapters. They remind you that Westeros is in a race against the clock -- a race which most inhabitants don't even realize they're in. The end of an Age is approaching. Bigger, scarier threats are looming and building. Winter is Coming. An Empire arises. Magic awakens. Whoever gets the Iron Throne isn't going to last too long. You're thus kept from getting too wrapped up in the civil war; you're reminded you of the big picture, which is more ominous and more hopeful all at the same time.

But if anyone can pull this division off, it would be Martin.