To me, methought, who waited with a crowd,
There came a bark that, blowing forward, bore
King Arthur, like a modern gentleman
Of stateliest port; and all the people cried,
"Arthur is come again: he cannot die."

"Morte d'Arthur" (1842)
Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Harry Potter Studies from Edwin Mellen

Edwin Mellen Press has a long history with publishing Arthurian studies, and I just came across this book earlier in the month. A number of the essays (in red) reference parallels between the series and the Arthurian story, and the final essay by Perry offers a detailed analysis linking Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to the Arthurian novels of T. H. White.

Scholarly Studies in Harry Potter: Applying Academic Methods to a Popular Text
Hallett, Cynthia Whitney , editor
Series: Studies in British Literature Number: 99

ISBN10: 0-7734-6010-1 ISBN13: 978-0-7734-6010-2 Pages: 300 Year: 2005
Imprint: Edwin Mellen Press
USA List Price: $109.95 UK List Price: £ 69.95

This book is intended primarily for an academic audience, especially scholars – students and teachers – doing research and publication in categories such as myth and legend, children’s literature, and the Harry Potter series in particular. Additionally, it is meant for college and university teachers. However, the essays do not contain jargon that would put off an avid “lay” Harry Potter fan. Overall, this collection is an excellent addition to the growing analytical scholarship on the Harry Potter series; however, it is the first academic collection to offer practical methods of using Rowling’s novels in a variety of college and university classroom situations.

Table of Contents

Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction – Serious Scholarship and Academic Hocus Pocus: Conjuring Harry Potter into the Canon (Cynthia Whitney Hallet)
1. Educating Harry Potter: A Muggle’s Perspective on Magic and Knowledge in the Wizard World of J. K. Rowling (Sarah E. Maier)
2. Harry Potter and the Temporal Prime Directive: Time Travel, Rule-Breaking, and Misapprehension in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Ron W. Cooley)
3. If yeh know where to go: Vision and Mapping in the Wizarding World (Jonathan P. Lewis)
4. A Basilisk, a Phoenix, and a Philosopher’s Stone: Harry Potter’s Myths and Legends (Peggy J. Huey)
5. Death and Rebirth: Harry Potter & the Mythology of the Phoenix (Sarah E. Gibbons)
6. The Harlequin in the Weasley Twins: Jesters in the Court of Prince Harry (and J. K. Rowling) (Rebecca Whitus Longster)
7. Lessons in Transfiguration: Allegories of Male Identity in Rowling’s Harry Potter Series (Casey Cothran)
– Conjuring Harry Potter into the Canon
8. Reading J. K. Rowling Magically: Creating C. S. Lewis’s “Good Reader” (Ernelle Fife)
9. The Problem of Identity in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Leigh A. Neithardt)
10. Of Young Magicians and Growing Up: J. K. Rowling, Her Critics, and the “Cultural Infantilism” Debate (Steve Barfield)
11. High-Brow Harry Potter: J. K. Rowling’s Series as College-Level Literature (Laura Baker Shearer)
12. Hogwarts vs. “The Values’ Wasteland”: Harry Potter and the Formation of Character (William Wandless)
13. Metaphor and MetaFantasy: Questing for Literary Inheritance in J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Evelyn M. Perry)
About the Contributors
Afterword

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