![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
So, Dumbledore. Ever since I started trying to formulate excuses for his behavior back when rereading book 5, I started thinking about the HP books in conjunction with Patricia McKillip's Riddlemaster trilogy. They're very different books-- HP is, of course, the old "child in muggle world finds out he is actually Magic!" and is told in an intentionally humorous and mundane style to match the world of magic being much like ours. Riddlemaster, contrarily, is all in high fantasy world, and told in McKillip's wonderfully lyric style.
(A digression before you do or don't read the rest of my ramble: I LOVE the Riddlemaster books. To little bits and pieces. I read them as a wide-eyed adolescent, and I read the first one by flipping to the last page first-- which I totally, very much, really do not recommend, unless there is no possible way you will read it otherwise-- and I love McKillip's writing in general, and I love Morgon and Raederele and Eliard and Lyra and Deth and basically all of them, and it presses a good many of my buttons. But at least two people whose judgement I respect found them all but unreadable. So... your mileage may vary. I'd imagine they are better read during adolescence.)
However. Both feature a sweet main character who turns out to be more than he seems, a character who Tries (though with flaws) To Do The Right Thing. This main character archetypically goes through a number of fantastic and interesting elements (Harry through Hogwarts school, Morgon through traveling). But what I'm really interested in is the main plot element in Harpist in the Wind and the almost identical main subplot of Deathly Hallows, which I think McKillip did exactly right and Rowling did clumsily. ( Cut for massive book-destroying spoilers for the Riddlemaster trilogy, and book-wounding spoilers for DH. )
(A digression before you do or don't read the rest of my ramble: I LOVE the Riddlemaster books. To little bits and pieces. I read them as a wide-eyed adolescent, and I read the first one by flipping to the last page first-- which I totally, very much, really do not recommend, unless there is no possible way you will read it otherwise-- and I love McKillip's writing in general, and I love Morgon and Raederele and Eliard and Lyra and Deth and basically all of them, and it presses a good many of my buttons. But at least two people whose judgement I respect found them all but unreadable. So... your mileage may vary. I'd imagine they are better read during adolescence.)
However. Both feature a sweet main character who turns out to be more than he seems, a character who Tries (though with flaws) To Do The Right Thing. This main character archetypically goes through a number of fantastic and interesting elements (Harry through Hogwarts school, Morgon through traveling). But what I'm really interested in is the main plot element in Harpist in the Wind and the almost identical main subplot of Deathly Hallows, which I think McKillip did exactly right and Rowling did clumsily. ( Cut for massive book-destroying spoilers for the Riddlemaster trilogy, and book-wounding spoilers for DH. )
