J.K. Rowling talks, people listen...

I am going to pause from posting about my trip to France and weigh in ony my thoughts to recent remarks by J.K. Rowling.

So if you have come here to read about France you can find those posts here, posts about the business and craft of writing can be found here. If you are a fan of the Harry Potter series and have read all seven books - keep reading. Otherwise, back away now lest ye be spoiled.

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That should be enough blank space to prevent people from reading things they do not want to learn about prematurely.

J.K. Rowling is on a publicity tour of the U.S. and has revealed things about her completed series that she had been coy about before.

First revelation:

She spoke about her series having Christian themes.

"To me [the religious parallels have] always been obvious," she said. "But I never wanted to talk too openly about it because I thought it might show people who just wanted the story where we were going."

Yup, I knew that. I knew that shortly after joining the fandom and reading a post on HPfGU's regarding an article in The American Prospect which in turn had quoted from an article published in the Vancouver Sun. Here's that quote:

Is she a Christian?

''Yes, I am,'' she says. ''Which seems to offend the religious right far worse than if I said I thought there was no God. Every time I've been asked if I believe in God, I've said yes, because I do, but no one ever really has gone any more deeply into it than that, and I have to say that does suit me, because if I talk too freely about that I think the intelligent reader, whether 10 or 60, will be able to guess what's coming in the books.''

Seeing that quote led to my longfelt belief that Harry Potter would have to be willing to sacrifice himself for the good of the Wizarding world.

I knew he was going to die.

It was only after Book 5 and the mention of the permanently locked door (containing the Power of Love) that I started thinking that he might be Resurrected to Life.

My friend John Granger author of Looking for God in Harry Potter can run a victory lap around Harry-haters such as Richard Abanes who wrote books claiming that the books were a bad influence on children. The Harry Potter series is in fact a great influence for children because it is great storytelling and has had an incredible impact on literacy. So take that Mr. Abanes - you were wrong!

Second Revelation:

Dumbledore was gay.

Did Dumbledore, who believed in the prevailing power of love, ever fall in love himself?
JKR: My truthful answer to you... I always thought of Dumbledore as gay. [ovation.] ... Dumbledore fell in love with Grindelwald, and that that added to his horror when Grindelwald showed himself to be what he was. To an extent, do we say it excused Dumbledore a little more because falling in love can blind us to an extent? But, he met someone as brilliant as he was, and rather like Bellatrix he was very drawn to this brilliant person, and horribly, terribly let down by him. Yeah, that's how i always saw Dumbledore. In fact, recently I was in a script read through for the sixth film, and they had Dumbledore saying a line to Harry early in the script saying I knew a girl once, whose hair... [laughter]. I had to write a little note in the margin and slide it along to the scriptwriter, "Dumbledore's gay!" [laughter] "If I'd known it would make you so happy, I would have announced it years ago!"

Jo also said after revelation: "You needed something to keep you going for the next 10 years! ...Oh, my god, the fan fiction now, eh?"


My reaction: Hmmm, I missed the boat on that one. Of course, I had not spent much time contemplating Dumbledore's love life or lack thereof. The most was an inchoate idea that perhaps he and Minerva McGonagall had a covert relationship. I considered that they might be secretly married and for appearances sake, they kept it under wraps. Or they could have just been a couple but without marital ties. Guess I was wrong on that score.

Dumbledore was gay and had been in love with Gellert Grindelwald. That will stir up a lot of plot bunnies and I am sure that within a month Fiction Alley will be filled with fanfic dedicated to Dumbledore/Grindlewald scenes from their younger years as well as their infamous duel. Whether or not they were lovers at one time was not specifically stated by Rowling.

I am sure that relationship will be explored in a myriad of ways. It also adds another layer of meaning to the lines in book 7 in the Daily Prophet interview with Rita Skeeter (p. 26, Scholastic hardcover edition):

"Very dirty business indeed. All I'll say is don't be so sure that there really was the spectacular duel of legend. After they've read my book, people may be foreced to conclude that Grindelwald simply conjured a white handkerchief from the end of his wand and came quietly!"



I predict that there will also be Dumbledore/Doge fanfic soon flooding the internet.

Honestly, there were only three characters that I really considered as showing outwardly gay characteristics in the series.

First was Gilderoy Lockhart with his shocking pink robes, penchant for using peacock quills, and a stated fondness for the color lilac. Then again, possibly Lockhart only had eyes for himself. Ye old Lockhart/Lockhart ship.

Second was Professor Grubbly-Plank. With her pipe smoking ways and her brush cut, it seemed to be waving a rainbow colored flag to say, "she's a lesbian."

Third was Rita Skeeter. Although I cannot say exactly what her sexuality was - because the idea of Skeeter engaged in any sexual activity is not something I wish to consider at all. However, with her "thick fingers" "heavy-jawed face," "surprisingly strong grip"(all from page 303 Scholastic paperback edition) and "large mannish hands" (p. 307) I was led to believe "That's a man, baby!"

Now onto the last revelation which is actually more of J.K. Rowling's authorial intent which many articles seem to focus on the idea that Rowling announced that she married a man like Harry Potter.

Questions about love were also directed at Rowling herself. When asked by an 18-year-old 12th grader, "Which of the Potter characters would you marry?," Rowling giggled. "The truth is, in my younger days, I dated Ron more than once," she admitted, giving an inside look at why Hermione (the closest character to Rowling's younger self) might be attracted to Harry's best friend. "He's fun to write, but not so much fun to date." And once she had learned her lesson, Rowling said, "I married Harry Potter," referring to her second husband, Neil Murray. "He's up there [in the wings]. I just mortified him," she laughed. "But he looks like Harry would look like, at a certain age. I married a very good person and a gutsy person. And that's who Harry is."

Fans might think that's even more reason why Hermione should end up with Harry — but Rowling said she always knew that Ron and Hermione were meant to be together, just as she thought Harry and Ginny were meant to be together. "I thought it was obvious, but apparently there are Internet wars about this," she said. "And they get very vicious." Rowling said she was unaware of the shipping wars for years, until someone suggested she take a look at the fan sites. "It was scary!" So many readers wanted Hermione and Harry to be a couple, Rowling said, that "I got hate mail ... from adults! Not people your age. You at least understood."

And for those who didn't, she explained. "Harry and Ginny are real soul mates," she said. "They're both very strong and very passionate. That's their connection, and they're remarkable together. Ron and Hermione, however, are drawn to each other because they balance each other out. Hermione's got the sensitivity and maturity that's been left out of Ron, and Ron loosens up Hermione a bit, gets her to have some fun. They love each other and they bicker a bit, but they enjoy bickering, so we shouldn't worry about it."

Yup, the shipping wars got vicious.

I am sorry that she received hate mail from adults. I am. I wrote to her and tried to be as diplomatic and forthright as possible in explaining the phenomenon of shipping.

I do not know if she ever saw my letter.

However, she has her own part in fanning the flames of the situation and turning what she knew was a heated situation into an inferno. I am referring to the Interview From Hell that I wrote about previously. I will just reiterate that it is not advisable for authors to tease your fans and then insult them. I did not appreciate her telling fans like myself to go back and re-read her books because we must have missed things. I lost my enthusiasm for the series in one quick quip. I am now a recovering Harry Potter addict. I have not eschewed the series altogether, but I do not have the same interest or passion on the subject.

However, the larger issue for discussion here was that the shipping wars demonstrated the passion that she created between the fans of her books with those characters she created. However, it still does not appear that she truly understands the phenomenon. Even after all the letters she will have received.

:wipes brow:

It seems she still does not understand why many fans wanted to see her hero become romantically linked with his best friend. Hermione was the most fleshed out female character in the series and one that readers grew to love - bushy hair, bucked teeth, and all. Those readers who were bookish females (like myself) found themselves identifying with Hermione.

A large part of the debate centered on which boy - Harry or Ron - would be better suited for her. Or which one it appeared that she preferred.

I thought Harry was better for her. I also thought she was demonstrated a devotion to him bordering on obsession. I did not see that same level of commitment from Hermione towards Ron.

We also knew that Jo Rowling on many occasions said that she patterned Hermione's character after herself. So the idea that Jo dated a Ron-like person, but chose as her husbnad a Harry-like character is not unlike some of the shipping debate rounds.

Many of the shipping debate rounds.

I also wish to state for the record that one of the reasons I did not like the Ron/Hermione interactions in the books (at least the first five when I was ship debating) was due to the bickering.

It annoyed me.

I did not find it to be anything that I would consider to be bantering. Not at all. Sniping, barking, and snarling, yes. Playful banter? No.

The statement that "they enjoy bickering" is something I dislike intensely.

There are times that my husband and I bicker, but it is never something that I enjoy.

I dislike watching people bicker. My in-laws remind me at times of two chihuahuas barking at one another.

It is not the same as playful banter. Not at all.

Bantering is fun. It is pleasant to engage in and enjoyable to watch.

So Jo thinks they like to bicker. :shudders: If you say so Jo, you are the author afterall.

I must say however, that there was something in which I can say "I Was Right!"

I knew deep in my bones that in order for Hermione and Ron to be a couple that he would have to respect her political thoughts regarding house-elves. It was, in fact, my first post on the infamous H/Hr vs. R/Hr Debate Thread on Fiction Alley: The Politics of House-elves.

Feel free to read it. I had summed up my argument with:

(U)ntil Ron recognizes that he is propping up an unjust system he cannot be someone that I think would be romantically suited for Hermione.

and


Ron needs to See The Light. Until he does, I can’t see any future with him and Hermione.

I felt really good when Ron and Hermione's first full on kiss on the mouth was after Ron said that they should make sure that the house-elves were safe from the final battle. At that point Hermione gave him a bone-crushing hug and smooch.

Huzzah!

I was right about that. He evolved as a character to the point where his political opinions matched hers.

I may have been wrong on other accounts in where the books were going, but I knew some things.

I knew they were based on Christian and Alchemical themes.

I knew Harry had to be willing to sacrifice himself.

I also knew that in order for Ron and Hermione to be a romantic couple they would have to see eye-to-eye on The Politics of House-Elves.

I pounded on that subject time and time again. That it all came down to politics.

And I was right. :-)

Linda

Sex, Blogs and National TV

Last night we had a wonderful meeting for my writers club, one of the best ever. It was due in no small part to our guest Joan Price and her amazing story of how her latest book Better Than I Ever Expected: straight talk about sex after sixty came about, and how her blog led to a recent appearance on ABC’s “Nightline.”

First off, Joan had written five books about health and fitness and was in the process of promoting her book, The Anytime, Anywhere Exercise Book when she got a call from her publisher’s publicist saying that she was trying to get Joan booked as a guest on a cable show in New York City called, “Naked New York.” The cable show dealt with sex issues, and did Joan have any exercises that were good for sex? Joan said yes, and then the publicist asked for a hook to grab the producers.

Joan answered, “Tell them I’m 59 years old and I’m having the best sex of my life!”

That did it.

She was booked as a guest. Joan thought she’d be able to get on the show and then ease on into talking about fitness. WRONG. They wanted to talk about sex.

As she sat in the Green Room waiting to go on as their last guest for the show, she kept hearing them promote her appearance before and after each commercial break with “And coming up, Joan Price who is 59 years old and having the best sex of her life.”

She said it made her sound like a freak.

Joan went on the show, and she did get to talk about fitness. For about ten seconds or so. They did mention and show her book, but mainly they wanted to ask her about having the best sex of her life as a woman in her late fifties.

She came home from that experience and talked with her lover (now husband) about it. She then started researching the market and found that there really weren’t any books about sex and the older woman where the subject was treated as anything other than a medical malady. Robert suggested that she write her own book on the subject.

Joan thought seriously about the idea. She bounced it off her agent, who felt that Joan’s expertise was in fitness books. She suggested that Joan consider ghost writing a book on sex.

Then comes the great part that I just love: Opportunity came looking for Joan.

She had a cover story article appear about fitness in the San Francisco Chronicle Magazine

and the Saturday after it was published, an acquisitions editor from Seal Press read Joan’s article. She liked it. She liked Joan’s voice. She went to her computer and looked to see what she could find out about Joan, and found Joan’s website.

The editor picked up the phone and called Joan, introduced herself and said that Seal Press published women’s titles, but doesn’t publish fitness nor self-help books. She then asked Joan if there were any other ideas for a book she had been dying to write.

BINGO.

Joan pitched the idea of writing a positive book about sexuality as you age. The twenty-something editor loved the idea.

Then, she told Joan that they were going to have a meeting on Tuesday to decide titles to acquire for the upcoming year. Could Joan have a book proposal to her by the next day?

That could have been the end of the story, because Joan had written book proposals before and knew exactly how much work went into book proposals and knew that it was an impossible task to start from scratch and have a full proposal done in less than 24 hours. And have it done right. She demurred due to the timing.

The editor then offered to help, because she knew exactly what was needed in order to convince the other people in the meeting.

A few days later, Joan had a contract to start writing the book.

Amazing, huh?

I had heard part of that story back in September when I met Joan at the Sonoma County Book Festival I was there with other writers representing the Redwood Writers branch of the California Writers Club, and Ana Manwaring told me that I had to meet Joan Price. She thought Joan was a kick in the pants.

I went over to Joan’s booth and started schmoozing. I was talking up the writers club and wanted to see if there was some angle for Joan to be a speaker for our writers group. We don’t want our meetings to be simply a series of book signings. No, there has to be something regarding the business of writing and publishing that will be informative for other writers.

In our conversation I casually asked Joan if she had a website or blog, because our October meeting was on the topic of literary websites and blogs. It was then she told me the story of how her website led to a book contract. After she told me that story, she wanted to make sure that I didn’t just think it was good luck on her part.

Hardly. I knew that for that to happen she had to have worked her tail off to have a presence on the web, and to make herself as an author known. And that hard work paid off.

I had her scheduled to speak as our guest, and then the producers of ABC’s “Nightline” decided to do a story about the Baby Boomers, sexuality and susceptibility to AIDS/HIV. They didn’t go through a stack of press releases from publicists to find Joan. Nope, they surfed the web and they found her blog.

A producer called Joan, identified herself as being from ABC Television said the magic words, “I’d like to chat with you about…”

Joan knew enough that this was their screening process to see whether or not she would be a good guest. The producer would decide based on that phone conversation if Joan could speak in sound bites and give pithy answers that would make good television.

Joan passed the pre-interview hurdle. Later the interview was scheduled and a film crew was hired from Marin County to do the filming of the segment, and a producer from New York flew out to interview Joan. They spent close to six hours with Joan filming her at house, watching her teach line dancing and also interviewing her. All that and Joan’s appearance in the segment amounted to only about two and a half minutes on the nationally televised show.

Then came the waiting game. Joan told me about her upcoming appearance and while I was excited for her, I also knew from the experience of friends of mine that “things happen” with TV appearances. Both friends were on nationally televised shows, but their appearances were blacked out in the local viewing area due to major news events pre-empting their shows. GRRRR.

This was back in the early 1990s and long before You Tube, the internet, etc. I never saw the shows.

Anyway, Joan found out that nationally televised news show have their own inherent rules for schedules. Such as breaking news of national importance trumps “evergreen” stories that can be aired anytime. Her show was scheduled and rescheduled several times. Hours after Joan sent out email alerts telling people to watch for her that night, she’d get word it wouldn’t be airing that night after all.

After several iterations on this schedule/reschedule theme, the show aired. She had a nice bump in traffic to her blog, and then a nationally syndicated radio show of irresponsible shock jocks heard about her appearance. Then her positive national exposure turned ugly.

Because these “forty-somethings” somehow think that sex by “sixty-somethings” is sick. And they turned their dim witted listeners into trolls who spammed her blog with filthy, disgusting, age-ist flames.

As if neither of the radio shock jocks want to have a satisfying sex life when they reach their sixties, and none of their single digit IQ fans can imagine reaching that milestone either.

Joan tracked down the source of the trolling from a fan website of the radio show, and then saw some of their own online comments to one another. Infantile and despicable.

The hosts of the radio show then had the nerve to call Joan and ask if she wanted to come on the air as a guest. She turned them down flat.

I’m glad she did. I know how talk radio works because I’ve listened to it, been a caller and guest for that medium for about fifteen years. The hosts control the microphone, and they can cut you off at any time. After you are no longer on-air, they can sit and trash you for as long as they like. Going on with a hostile host is always a dicey proposition, and their listening audience was not Joan’s target market.

It would have been a waste of her time, and most likely a negative experience.

Furthermore, I’m thinking that those men/adolescent boys who made such sick comments about sexuality and aging need to realize that Karma can be a Real Bitch.

Joan wound up deleting the horrible comments on her blog, but unfortunately it was the same day that she received coverage by a local newspaper columnist telling about her appearance on national television and gave her blog address.

She just hopes there weren’t too many people who read the nasty-gram laden comment trail before she had a chance to delete them. She also changed her blog to screen comments before they are posted for the public to see.

Joan told us her story last night with verve, candor and great humor.

Our meeting room was packed, and we kept having people show up throughout the meeting. It was a great night for networking and for learning about how with persistence, hard work and talent that you can sometimes create your own good luck.

Thanks Joan!

Linda

Oh, and her book is a riot. I came home and started reading it. Funny, honest and energetic. Just like Joan.

Here's another perspective on that fabulous meeting from another writer who I'm still working on becoming a member.