Hogwarts Herald

It begins. Here we meet the Dursleys, Dumbledore, McGonagall and Hagrid. What struck me about this chapter, the very first chapter in all the Harry Potter books - the beginning of it all, is just how much extra information the reader is given. Information that won’t mean anything at all for many years to come.

I once read that JK Rowling spent 2 years planning out her books before she wrote a single chapter. It shows. The books are seamless, chapter flowing to chapter, book flowing to book. The books are devoid of the usual stuff you see - a character ‘accidentally’ dying and then, upon the author realising that the character is later needed, the character reappears, claimed missing rather than dead, or magically brought to life. There is no ‘magically brought to life’ in the HP books - when they’re dead, they’re dead. I think the best of us thought that maybe, just maybe, Lily and James might come back. Or that Sirius didn’t really die. And certainly not Dumbledore. It must have all been an elaborate trick, concocted by Dumbledore himself. But no - dead is dead, and it all works perfectly.

I digress. I’m meant to be talking about the first chapter of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s / Sorcerer’s stone. So, what are the things that are mentioned in the first chapter that we initially skimmed over, having no idea of their importance?

First of all, there’s You-Know-Who. The name sounds funny, and it seems like your typical children’s book bad guy. But we don’t know as yet just why he has this pseudonym. Why no one says his real name - because it’s a lot more than just choosing a funny name to keep the kids interested.

Then there’s Dumbledore’s put-outer - the little clicker that can put lights out. We don’t really discover its importance until partway through book 7.

We find out that McGonagall is a cat and a woman. We don’t think much about it - after all, this is a book about magic, and a book for children. But we won’t find out just how significant animagus are to the story until several books later.

And we hear about Godric’s Hollow - again, it’s importance isn’t revealed until much, much later. In fact if you’d asked me, before I started re-raeding from the very start, if I’d heard of Godric’s Hollow in book 1, chapter 1, I would have said of course not. But there it is. Seamlessly integrated into the very beginning, just a taste, so that it has a tiny bit more meaning and significance when it finally comes to light.

And don’t even get me started on the references to Sirius Black.

To be continued…

On a completely unrelated note - does anyone watch the Simpsons? I know I do… so why not head over to the Simpsons blog and check out the latest news?