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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 18, 2012 9:07:33 GMT -5
Oooh, that gives me more ideas. Then They could rent out the elves - with very strict contracts, of course, to protect them from abuse - and use the money to improve the school! Hire proper teachers for DADA, Potions, History ... buy new brooms ... oh, the possibilities!
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 18, 2012 9:14:18 GMT -5
Now that is a good idea!
And I can even see the elves going along with earning money like that - after all it will help the school in the long run.
// I'll have to see if I can fit that into my fic somehow, if you don't mind...
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Post by kumainpink on Jun 18, 2012 9:15:00 GMT -5
If only Wizarding Britain could be more sensible...
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 0:58:09 GMT -5
Now that is a good idea! And I can even see the elves going along with earning money like that - after all it will help the school in the long run. // I'll have to see if I can fit that into my fic somehow, if you don't mind... Feel free to use that - I'd like to see that used somewhere. |
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Post by anon on Jun 19, 2012 7:34:41 GMT -5
dumbledore said love was harry's 'weapon', question we know how his love for Sirius hurt Voldemort, but how come it did nothing for the peice of it's soul, would Harry still be able to speak to snakes or at least understand bits of the language he is familiar with?
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 8:01:11 GMT -5
That made never much sense to me in the first place - how was Harry supposed to know what love is when he never experienced any? Friendship is not the same as love. Whenever I see that argument, I want to ask if Harry was supposed to hug and kiss Snake-face to death? It's just stupid to base the outcome of a war on the love of a child that had never gotten any. If Harry sacrificed himself, then more out of the feeling that he's less worth than his friends, IMO.
As for the soulpiece, why was it not destroyed in the chamber already?
I think JKR said he couldn't speak with snakes any more after the Final Battle, though not absolutely sure. Personally, I think it is strange - if the ability is tied to the soulpiece, then how can Harry speak it, not the soulpiece - which couldn't talk, but didn't possess him, either?
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 9:31:14 GMT -5
I think JKR said he couldn't speak with snakes any more after the Final Battle, though not absolutely sure. Yes, I remember that, too. I think it also says so in his hp wiki entry... I think most problems come from JKR writing a children's book. Frankly, most of the problems you mentioned wouldn't have existed at all, if Harry had simply died in the end. Because, let's face it, what Dumbles said at King's Cross Station about Harry and love and all that (mind, it could just have been Harry's imagination the whole thing) just sounded like an excuse prepared for the off chance that Harry might survive. The horcrux would have been just as dead had Harry died along with it (like Nagini). So, I'm fairly certain that ultimately it made no difference to Dumbles what the outcome would be. But since JKR thought that Harry (being the hero and all that) simply couldn't die, he obviiously had to survive. Which means that only the soulpiece could have died. Think about it, otherwise the story might have been a lot darker: Harry (the real Harry Potter) might just as well have died when he was one year old, and the soul inside of the boy who grew up might have been just the horcrux. Enabling him to speak Parseltongue. And generally do a lot of other stuff Tommy did, too. So, yeah, I think that most of the plot holes originate in JKR's fear. It's not unusal either. A lot of authors have trouble making really bad things happen to their beloved characters - I'm sure it's a feeling we all are familiar with.  Thanks. I will. ;D |
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 10:52:32 GMT -5
So, yeah, I think that most of the plot holes originate in JKR's fear. It's not unusal either. A lot of authors have trouble making really bad things happen to their beloved characters - I'm sure it's a feeling we all are familiar with. LOL, yes. Don't need another Return of the King, where I end up in tears every time I read it or watch the movie. And there Frodo not even died! Never have forgiven JKR for killing Sirius, who was my favourite, after all. To do the same to Harry, after Fred, Remus and Tonks, would have been way too much. Though you can't explain all the plotholes with that. She said she had worked out the whole story from the beginning, but I am inclined to think she had at best a vague idea and sometimes got carried away and wrote stuff which didn't fit really with the overall storyline, or she clung too much to early ideas, even if they didn't fit any more. Sometimes you just have to let the characters take over, even though they give the story a twist you hadn't planned at all. |
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 12:13:50 GMT -5
She said she had worked out the whole story from the beginning, but I am inclined to think she had at best a vague idea and sometimes got carried away and wrote stuff which didn't fit really with the overall storyline, or she clung too much to early ideas, even if they didn't fit any more. That's a very good point, too. I've noticed a lot of writer's having problems with discarding the very first idea they had, probably out of fear that than the story wouldn't be "their story" anymore, even if it has obviously outgrown that first idea. I'm not taking me out of that group either. I, too, cling to my earlier ideas, and throwing one out is always a real fight. So, I know how that feels. Or, perhaps, she kept adding more and more information while planning and didn't notice that some of it contradicted other parts - because there was so much of it and because you as the writer yourself seldom notice errors that are glaringly obvious to others (like those texts you write and check three times. Then you print them out, give them to a friend and he goes: "Hey, did you see, you made a typo there, and this part here doesn't make sense at all." *sigh*) |
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 12:21:55 GMT -5
Yes, been there myself. In some cases I have a whole collection of scenes that don't fit any more. And then there are these ideas that contradict each other from the beginning - it can be a challenge to find a way to combine them without ruining the whole story.
That happens to a writer easily, yes. BUT that's what the publishers have editors for! And hers did a very poor job, if you ask me. Not only in regards to all these plotholes, but language-wise as well. Some time ago, I took the chapter "The Order of the Phoenix" and went over the part where the teenagers are told the bit the adults were willing to reveal. After that, I wanted to bang my head. Hard. Go and count how many times it is "said Harry, said Molly, said Harry, said Sirius ..." versus "asked Harry" or whatever could be used. That's bad editing. Very, very bad editing.
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 12:58:09 GMT -5
*nods*
Yes, I see what you mean.
Sometimes I wonder if publishers economise by having just one editor go over a novel script... and an inexperienced at that. But I'm not sure how it is done in Britain. I know that in Germany most editors (Lektoren) are students or freelancers and because of that their editorial abilities vary vastly. Also, most of them are paid very badly. *shrugs*
It does seem strange, though, that a publisher would try to save money on the HP series, especially the later books where a bestseller was already guaranteed. I imagine that PS had been edited by a "beginner" but the latter books should have been edited by someone professional...
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 13:03:49 GMT -5
Exactly. By the fifth book, they most definitely knew they would easily sell millions of copies the very first day already. They should have been able to at least pay a proper editor! And they should have known that the books would be taken apart sentence for sentence and gone over with a very fine comb by the fans, so I'd expect them to put a bit more effort in.
You know, I can excuse the many mistakes in the German edition by the time pressure Fritz was under, at least to a certain extent, but the original publisher doesn't have that excuse in my eyes.
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 13:07:58 GMT -5
Well, it might have been that they really didn't have enough time to go through it with a fine comb themselves. If a book is scheduled to be published on time for christmas shopping, and the author brings it in on the last day of the deadline (I imagine that happenes a lot), than maybe they simply don't have enough time themselves... in my experience most people aren't very good at planning possible delays into their schedules.
...
just theorising here, though...
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 13:21:52 GMT -5
That's true, but still ... I am a bit disappointed that they were unable to do their job properly even für such a book.
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 13:23:53 GMT -5
That's true, but still ... I am a bit disappointed that they were unable to do their job properly even für such a book. Me too. But there isn't anything one can do about it but lament the fact.  |
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 13:24:57 GMT -5
Sadly, yes. And to think that I did give up the German translation because I was fed up with the mistakes! |
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 13:41:34 GMT -5
I've never read the German translation in the first place. I tend to only read the English Originals of novels. The only books I read in German are actually written by German authors, because I always feel that the books is better in its original version.
I do have a plattdeutsch version of CoS, though. It was a gift from a friend and it's a really fun read. The translators must have had lots of fun, too, coming up with the plattdeutsch words for all the magical stuff. Fluffy is actually called "Plüschi" in it. ;D
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 13:52:13 GMT -5
When I started reading HP, I'd not have understood the original. While I learned English in school, I could never use it and had forgotten most of it. Only later I got accidentally to give it a try and slowly re-learned again. When GoF came out, I did read first the original, but didn't understand everything, and had to get the German edition, too. But since then, I've only read the English version.
IMO you haven't missed anything with the translation. Colours and numbers messed up, and lots of very strange translations. (Excuse me, but happy = unglücklich? Really??). The worst is my favourite book, PoA. The initial edition is completely messed up, the showdown in the Shrieking Shack shortened by a few pages (!!), they left everything out that had to do with responsibility (Hermione demanding that Harry hands the map in ...) or where Sirius gets angry. The translator insists that he got the wrong manuscript from Bloomsbury to work with, which I find hard to believe - why would they hand out manuscripts when they are still editing? Only in later editions, they silently and secretly added these parts, corrected some mistakes and made new ones ...
There was a whole collection of mistakes on the net. I know I contributed to it. And I know in the schoolbooks there was the English word for Paarhufer somewhere (too lazy to look it up), and do you know how it was translated? Pferd! *whimpers* Horses are Unpaarhufer, for heavens sake! That's just sloppy work.
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 14:07:45 GMT -5
I'm not sure when I started reading books in english, but it was fairly early. I vaguely remember reading the Sherlock Holmes short stories when I was in grade 9 or 10. And I completely stopped reading German novels when I started university. Because once there, I suddenly had ready access to lots and lots of english Originals (and the fact that I studied English Studies probably had something to do with it, too).
By now, it's gone so far that I open a German novel, read the first few sentences and think that the whole grammar and sentence structure feels wrong. Even writing stories in German has become a drudgery. Which is sad, really, because I would like to write stories in German. I really would. But somehow it always sounds as if a 12 year old has written it. *sigh*
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 14:14:01 GMT -5
That's how I react to German fanfiction. Both for HP and for LotR. And Lotr in German sounds now a bit strange, too.
As I can't really speak English, for me it was different, it was just an accident that I got back into English, and by now I am reading more English than German, but I still read other stuff in German. Though it's sometimes getting ridiculous - I've got an online Dutch friend, and when we planned that she came visiting me, we decided to chat a bit in German, to give her some chance to practice (it's only her third language, she feels more comfortable with English, so that's what we use). After an hour, I suddenly realised that I was thinking English and translating it back into German before typing it down ... could really have hit myself. And I am beginning to sometimes mess up my German because I have only the English version in my mind and either can't remember the German word or catch myself translating too literally and get tangled in the different grammar. Is that crazy or what?
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 14:20:48 GMT -5
And I am beginning to sometimes mess up my German because I have only the English version in my mind and either can't remember the German word or catch myself translating too literally and get tangled in the different grammar. Is that crazy or what? No not at all. It happens to me all the time. Of course, I also spend my days at work surrounded by a lot of english speaking collegues, so unless I'm meeting German friends later that day I occasionally spend whole days stuck in "English thinking"-mode. It goes so far that I talk to my pets (or myself) in English when I'm at home.  Personally, I find it easier to not switch languages back and forth the whole time. So, even when I'm speaking to a German co-worker, I tend to talk to them in English. Although, I did once hold a memorable three way discussion where a friend asked me something in German, I answered in English, my sister commented in Platt, and my friend answered in Dutch. It went back and forth for a while. At some point we noticed everyone else in the train waggon was staring at us. It was epic. ;D |
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 19, 2012 14:26:01 GMT -5
At least I don't talk English, lol. But between fanfiction and chatting, I type way too much English. And lately I tend to call my pony Miss Picky or Miss Piggy (depending ) Lol, that conversation must have been funny. Can't blame the people for staring  It's hard to keep that up without getting confused. It reminds me of the time when my (German) friend brought an American friend along whose German was at about the level my English was back then ... my friend had to translate back and forth and ended up talking English to me and German to the American. Didn't exactly help the understanding |
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Post by Ithiarel on Jun 19, 2012 14:43:28 GMT -5
... my friend had to translate back and forth and ended up talking English to me and German to the American. Didn't exactly help the understanding ;D No, I imagine that it didn't. *rofl* If you don't speak English, I guess you only read and write it? Huh? Well, you are definitely saving yourself all the accent and dialect hassle with it. I have this habit to copy the English accent people use when they speak with me. That's really annoying for some people. But somehow I just can't help it. Occasionally, it's kind of funny (Some tourists once mistook me for a Welsh, because I had talked to an exchange student from there before talking to them; they even went so far as to explicitly ask if i was from Cardiff...) but mostly it's a hassle, because I'm never quite sure how to pronounce a word correctly, or if a certain pronounciation I have in mind is more British English of more American, or even Indian English. (I also have a co-worker from Australia, which doesn't help at all... *grumble*) |
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Post by dracosfairmaiden on Jun 19, 2012 15:36:31 GMT -5
Wow, Kitty I'm impressed. You can write English so well. Seriously, I read your posts and there are hardly any mistakes. I'm from America so I can only read, write, and speak English.
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Post by Kitty279 on Jun 20, 2012 0:31:50 GMT -5
*blushes* Thank you, fair maiden! Well, I do my best, and if I make mistakes, you know why. I think my syntax is still sometimes a bit off. English is mandatory at schools here, so everyone learns it at least a bit. I guess you'd not have the same need, with English you get much further than with German. So I learned the basics at school, then forgot most of it again - to the point that I even had problems to understand a children's picture book  But then I started to read HP, which led to Tolkien - and thanks to the dear Professor and a very good fanfiction archive, I finally not only refreshed my English, but learned it properly. Though my choice in reading led to me being better with medieval armour and weapons than with modern day electronic ;D |
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Post by physicssquid on Jul 2, 2012 19:41:32 GMT -5
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Post by heraldofdreams on Jul 8, 2012 16:30:26 GMT -5
Though my choice in reading led to me being better with medieval armour and weapons than with modern day electronic ;D I'm with you there, my choice of books gives me lots of random knowledge about that kind of thing and then I hit modern stuff and I'm like 'WHAT?' And as far as your English goes, I would have never guessed it's not your native language. You write/speak it very well. ;D I was looking for a thumbs up button but we don't have it *lol* |
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Post by Kitty279 on Jul 9, 2012 0:25:16 GMT -5
*snicker* Yes, when you read Lord of the Ring all the time, and then you stumble over 'plug' and 'refrigerator', that sort of stuff, you end up confused for a moment. Thank you so much for the compliment  Oh, and I think that's what exalt/smite (at the bottom of the name box in the left) is for: Thumbs up and down. Took me a bit to figure that out, too |
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Post by kumainpink on Jul 9, 2012 1:25:19 GMT -5
If that's the case, you get a big thumbs up, Kitty~! Oh, and I just wanted to say this: Dumbledore is a barmy old fart.  |
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Post by Kitty279 on Jul 9, 2012 1:34:02 GMT -5
You too, Kuma!
Btw, when you read stuff set in a medieval time, and then you see keyboard, what do you think first? Because I know I imagined one of these little plates with hooks to hang keyrings up, not the computer keyboard ;D
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It's hard to keep that up without getting confused. It reminds me of the time when my (German) friend brought an American friend along whose German was at about the level my English was back then ... my friend had to translate back and forth and ended up talking English to me and German to the American. Didn't exactly help the understanding 
But then I started to read HP, which led to Tolkien - and thanks to the dear Professor and a very good fanfiction archive, I finally not only refreshed my English, but learned it properly. Though my choice in reading led to me being better with medieval armour and weapons than with modern day electronic ;D
