:: Half-Blood Prince, Deathly Hallows

[delphipsmith]

Over the weekend I reread Half-Blood Prince ('cause, you know, the movie) and then, because I couldn't stop THERE, Deathly Hallows. I had re-read HBP right before DH came out two years ago but hadn't picked up either of them since (except to do a little fact-checking for the Nurse on occasion LOL!). Both were FAR better than I'd remembered; DH in particular was much better, I think because having read it before I was now able to pick up on all the little clues and hints, so everything made much more sense than the first time through. Cried over Dobby and Snape again, of course, especially Snape -- such a sad, lonely man, so twisted and tormented, and yet so courageous, so clever. One tiny moment whose power was lost on me the first time through but which struck me with full impact this time: as Snape is dying (that's not a spoiler, right? Is there anyone on the planet who doesn't know that?), his last words are a whisper to Harry, "Look...at...me." And I suddenly understood why: because Harry has his mother's eyes, and Severus wanted to see Lily's eyes one last time. (See?? I get all choked up just writing about it, even now!) For an allegedly kids' book, Rowling packs an awful lot of adult emotion into the last one.

I'd forgotten in how many different ways Voldemort is thwarted by his inability to comprehend love. Not just Harry's mother's love for him, which started the whole thing, but Narcissa's love for her son, Snape's love for Lily, Harry's love for Dumbledore...it's woven all through the books, in ways both obvious and subtle. Nicely done.

It was also an odd sensation reading these two having read a lot of HP fan-fic in the interim. At one point I recall thinking, "Oh yeah, I remember the backstory to that" before realizing "No wait, Rowling didn't WRITE that particular backstory" LOL! Fortunately that was the extent of it -- an occasional hiccup, as it were -- and none of the NC-17 fanfic I've read distracted me from my enjoyment of the actual tale.

Still puzzling over how anyone deduced Dumbledore being gay out of the whole thing though. If Rowling hadn't said it I never would have thought it.

Comments

[go-team-venture.livejournal.com]

I thought it was pretty obvious that he was in love, so it didn't surprise me when he was outed. I do want to see how that plays out on film now that everyone knows.