Will Uncle Ted play the role of a Hogwarts ghost? Memory, dementia and mysteries of the past.

    Two things keep me blogging and attending events like the Harry Potter Academic Conference year after year: the scholarship and the friendships I've formed with other scholars. I'm not alone in this:  check out the latest Potterversity episode for commentary from others who feel the same.

    One such friend is David Martin, loyal Hufflepuff and retired computerscientist, who I first met at LeakyCon 2014, where we bonded over the shared experience of being several decades older than the average attendee. Since then, we've met regularly at events such as Misti-Con and on a near-annual basis at the Chestnut Hill Harry Potter Conference. Viewers of the Hogwarts Tournament of Champions will remember him as the standout player of the victorious Badger team, for which I happily cheered him on, despite my place in the Ravenclaw studio audience. 

    David recently surprised and delighted me with a charming relic from my own field of behavior analysis:  a note his mother received in the 1940's from B.F. Skinner himself, along with Skinner's own guidelines for his famous baby tender box, which would eventually be marketed as the Air Crib. 

Note:  please do not confuse this crib with the Skinner boxes developed for use in Skinner's work with rats and pigeons; they are very different things, as the link above explains. 

I will be delighted to display this piece of my disciplinary history in my office and to be able to boast of possessing the autograph of one of the giants in my field, or, at least, that of his secretary.

    Like me, David's fondness for Harry Potter led him to read the Cormoran Strike series, and he, too appreciates the connections between the two series. At the most recent HPAC. David gave me another history-themed gift in the form of his fantastic talk, "About the Hogwarts Ghosts." I had been mulling over Uncle Ted's dementia, and during Davi'd presentation, something clicked with me. The gist of David's thesis was, Hogwarts ghosts are atypical literary ghosts, compared to those seen in Shakespeare and Dickems. Rather than seeking vengance, or bringing warnings about the afterlife, "Hogwarts ghosts represent the pervasive influence of the past on the present." (You can read his full abstract at the conference program here). Once might be tempted to call them living history books, except, of course, they are all dead. But, from the literal History Professor Binns, to Moaning Myrtle, to Nearly Headless Nick to Helena Ravenclaw, the ghosts serve a function of telling Harry and friends things about the past that help them resolve their current predicament. What does this have to do with the still-living Uncle Ted? Find out after the jump. 

Potterversity Essay Volume Released: A Must-Read for Potter Nerds.

 If you don't mind a bit of a plug here, I am happy to announce that Potterversity: Essays Exploring the World of Harry Potter, edited by my good friends Katy McDaniel and Emily Strand. is now ready for purchase. I got my author's copy in the mail today, having contributed an essay: "The Weasley Witches: From Snitches to Stitches to Not-My-Daughter-You-Bitches" to the Questions of Character section. It looks great and I can't wait to read the whole thing. 

This book would make a wonderful holiday gift for your favorite Potter nerd. Not only does my own chapter address the magic of Mrs. Weasley's hand-knit Christmas sweaters, but co-editor Emily Strand has an entire chapter on the literary and spiritual significance of Christmas celebrations in the series. 

You can learn more about the book on this week's Potterversity Podcast #43, which was recorded at the Chestnut Hill Harry Potter Academic Festival. 

Enjoy!

Rings, Double-bands, Stars and Asterisks: Which model works works for a ten-book Cormoran Strike series? (Plus: who it predicts killed Leda!)

Several weeks ago, I made the first efforts at a revised structural model , the "Double Wedding Band" or a ten-part Strike series, based on the connections seen between volumes to date.  To my surprise, that proved to be one of the most popular posts that has provoked some great comments. I have been eagerly waiting to see what other Serious Strikers would think of the connections The Running Grave makes to other Strike novels. 

I got my wish a week or so ago. Dr. John Granger is back to doing what he does best and recognized, as ring structure predicts, that The Running Grave does, indeed, "latch" to The Cuckoo's Calling, in the same way that the first Harry Potter book, Philosopher's Stone, latches with the seventh and last, Deathly Hallows. John literally wrote the book on the ring composition of Harry Potter, and I encourage Strike fans to check out his application of both the "turtleback" and the "asterisk" to Cormoran Strike.  I also encourage readers to answer his call for more CC-TRG echoes, which, as of this posting, no Substack reader has heeded, although some contributions can be found at the wordpress placeholder post.  Lest anyone think I am being secretive, I did link to my own long list in a comment, which, amusingly, Dr. Granger apparently choose to remove. 

Unfortunately, Dr. Granger's turtleback and asterisk models, which very elegantly account for Harry Potter series echoes, fail to account for all the echoes we see in the Strike-Ellacott series. For example:

1. The Silkworm-Troubled Blood connections: The many connections between these two books initially inspired my 2022 idea that TB was originally intended as a Book Six albedo. At the time, even Mr. Granger called the idea a "convincing" "brilliant" and "radical piece of reverse prognostication", but I had to eventually dismiss the idea when Rowling herself denied it. 
2. The Cuckoo's Calling-Career of Evil connections:  The most obvious connection is the in vino veritas confessions i the Tottenham, Strike to Robin in CC, Robin-to-Strike in CoE, but there are certainly others.  This was originally part of my Double Pentagram proposal, which had some advantages, but did not work so well when TIBH turned out to have the connections it did. 
3. The Troubled Blood- The Running Grave connections: Both the Strike and Ellacott files podcast and the Three Broomsticks predictions episode foresaw these, based on the number of Lethal White-The Ink Black Heart connections observed. This prediction certainly came through, in spades. It is, I believe, the only list that comes close to rivaling Lethal White-Goblet of Fire connections in sheer number. In fact, the overall large number of connections between non-adjacent books inspired my Leapfrog post. 
4. The major exception to the non-adjacent connections rule: the thematic links and resetting processes that happend in Troubled Blood and The Ink Black Heart.  Not only do the main murders connect, with Gus as an amalgam of the three TB killers, the books themselves invert the expected dry-nigredo/ wet-albudo pairings and several progressions between the "best friends" are reversed or reset in ITBH. 

Podcast News for Strike and Potter Fans

This week, listeners of The Strike and Ellacott Files podcast got a pleasant surprise: the hosts plan to release episodes on a weekly rather than biweekly basis. This week's episode, on Chapters 5-7 of The Running Grave, covered all sorts of topics, from the theme of parenting in the series, to the Orwellian allusions to, as always, lots of Strellacott shipping. While I've never minded long podcasts, the shorter. weekly versions will be much more convenient for many.  As one of my Twitter pals put it, "It's like having wine night with three really close friends that get me." Tune in for some great discussion. 

I also listened to the first few episodes of Harry Potter After 2020, a new podcast from two moms who are re-reading the Harry Potter series, chapter by chapter, and sharing their thoughts on how their view of the series has changed over time, both as a result of their own growth processes and also because of news evens such as the election of Donald Trump, COVID, Black Lives Matter, January 6th, and JKR's public position on transgender issues. Having enjoyed co-host Lorrie Kim's annual presentations at the Harry Potter Academic conference since 2014, I expected to enjoy the podcast, and I did. With new episodes every Wednesday and seven increasingly long books to cover, I expect to be listening for some time. 

I also recommend Lorrie's book, Snape: The Definitive Analysis of Hogwart's Mysterious Potion Master, which was updated in 2022. 

Note:  this post is also available on Substack,

Seeking reader feedback: Move to substack?

 Dear readers: 

The Farting Sofa Faculty Lounge has been open on Blogspot a bit over six months, and I am delighted with the response: ofer 40,000 visits, with more than half of those in the last two months, as might be predicted in the lead-up to and publication of The Running Grave.  

When I found myself suddenly in need of my own platform after many years of publication on Hogwartsprofessor. I defaulted to blogspot, the blogging platform with which I was most familiar. However, I have gotten feedback from some readers that they are unable to post comments, or have no choice but to do so anonymously.  I am therefore considering moving to a different platform, specifically Substack.

This is not an attempt to monetize: I have no plans for paid subscriptions or pledge requests.  What I am interested in knowing is  1) if that platform makes commenting easier and 2) if readers would find notification by email of new posts helpful. 

I am playing with the new platform and currently have a placeholder site up, with the most recent 25 posts copied over.  I invite people to check it out. and, particularly for those of you who have found commenting on this site to be difficult or impossible, I invite you to try there.  Feel free to leave feedback on the pros and cons of such a move on either site. 

Link to The Farting Sofa Faculty Lounge, Substack Edition. 

One way or another, the Lounge will remain open.  I have plans for follow ups to the meaningful names posts, the Double Wedding Band model and a plan for an in-depth look at how Hassan's Combating Cult Mind Control informs not just The Running Grave, but earlier JKR/RG works as well. 

I'll consider reader feedback before I decide whether to make the switch.  Thank you all for sharing your thoughts. 

Strike Character Costume Packets: Fans Unite in Laughter on Twitter

 Note:  as of today, I will stop including indicating spoilers for The Running Grave in blue text. This is a largely light post, but the costume descriptions could contain mild spoilers. 

While the general purpose of The Farting Sofa Faculty Lounge is to take a serious look at Cormoran Strike, Harry Potter and other popular fiction. it is occasionally nice to pause and have some fun.  Twitter, while it may be a free range for toxicity for the Anomies of the world, it is also a place fans can connect, communicate and enjoy a laugh over their favorite obsessions.  One example is the collection of Strike character twitter posts. that appeared in the run-up to The Ink Black Heart. 

Last night, there was a Twitter challenge to recreate the popular Adult Halloween Costume Meme for Strike characters.  I had never tried that, or any other meme before but I could not resist trying once I learned how. 

My first attempt was the wonderful Pat Chauncey:

Next, I tried Mazu Wace:

And finally, the despicable Hugh Jacks.

There are some other great ones on Twitter.  My personal favorite is Bijou Watkins.  You can also view Ryan Murphy, Roy Carver, and of course, Strike himself. 

If anyone wants to try their own, the generator is here. 

Happy costuming!