Letters to the Editor
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a journalistic conceit
But while it's all well and good to see kids giddy at the news of their hero's homosexuality, Rowling's interest in making things perfectly clear (or queer, to borrow queer theorist Alex Doty's pun), not only about Dumbledore but also about the future and livelihood of all of her characters, provokes thorny questions about the role and responsibilities of an author once she has concluded her text.
The role of an author after concluding a work of fiction is anything she wants it to be, and she has no responsibilities to anyone that she doesn't voluntarily assume. There's nothing thorny about it, only a conceit constructed by Ms Traister to write a story around.
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Nice one
Responding to the very first comment: we'll take our economy, thanks. London is rapidly displacing New York as the centre of global financial capital, and the U.S. economy is sinking into a subprime morass. When it costs you US$1.04 to buy a Canadian dollar, you really ought not throw stones.
And JK Rowling created these characters; she can say anything she wants about them. Whether you choose to have her statements fit into your personal Harry Potter universe or not is up to you.
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Lighten up
After years of having to protect everything about her stories like they were nuclear launch codes, Rowling can now finally openly discuss her creation with her fans. Cut her a break if she wants to enjoy it. (And I agree with others here who have noted that only a fiction writer can understand what that feels like.)
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Why are you applying adult critiques to a children's series?
Not only does it seem absurd to me to try to define the limits of a writer's power over their own imagination, it seems even more out-of-place to critize a children's author for supposedly not living up to the standards of high art.
We might expect subtle, intricate narrative techniques from Shakespeare and other great authors---authors who write for adults. However, Rowling writes for children; just because adults also enjoy her stories does not mean that they are the target audience.
In my view, children like immediate gratification and overabundance. For example, as I child I adored "wax bottles"--bottle-shaped wax envelopes containing colored sugar syrup. As an adult, I can't stand their cloying sweetness. The same is true for information---children like to get answers, not to be put off with frustrating enigmas. However, as they grow to adults, they usually begin to appreciate grey areas and mysterious unanswerable questions.
The point is, children do not and cannot view literature as adults do. Why would we want them to? As it is, Rowling is a great resource for them in helping them understand how an author's mind works.
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Holly Capote is right
It is a bad idea for authors to keep talking past the end of the book, fictional ones, at least. It's like a chef presenting a wonderful, visually impressive dessert, and then offering to let you lick the bowl it came out of.
Fortunately for Rowling, if this becomes a nasty literary cause celebre, she can cry all the way to the bank, which she probably owns by now.
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Gay. Yay.
I do like a certain amount of information left unrevealed and up to the reader's imagination in works of fiction. However, I am glad that Rowling established unequivocally that Dumbledore is gay. Particularly for teenagers struggling with sexual identity and those who might come from homophobic families, the fact that one of the major protagonists of the Harry Potter series is gay might help legitimize their own questioning and also break down stereotypes and fears about homosexuals. Especially since she is writing primarily for the emerging generation, this effort to address homosexuality gets a big thumbs up from this reader.
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Enough with the whining!
RT: Stop with the whining about JKR's comments at a fan gathering. (That goes for the rest of you.)
In case you've been living under a frickin' rock for the past few decades, fan fictioneers have been refusing to let stories "end" for ages now. Why should Rowling?
The oldest extant community of fan fiction writers and readers is the Baker Street Irregulars, the group of fans of Sherlock Holmes who keep the flame alive. It was the actions and reactions of Holmes fans that not only started fan fiction as we know it -- though they called it 'pastiches' back then -- but wound up convincing Holmes' creator to bring Holmes back from his 'death' at Reichenbach for many more adventures. (One wishes Rowling would do the same for Snape, for whom she has this wildly veering love-hate thing going on, but hey, there's always fan fiction.)
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Gay wizards
Rowling is clear from the moment Harry spots a photo of young Dumbledore with a "handsome companion." In the shot, the boys are "laughing immoderately with their arms around each other's shoulders."
Most likely this image is inspired by the (fairly) well known photograph of the teenage George Orwell bathing with a group of friends at the River Thames and hamming it up for the camera. No need to make any assumptions about sexual content.
This is really like Sherlock Holmes studies, in which a whole field of knowledge has developed around arcane explanations of accidental continuity glitches between stories (like Dr. Watson's wife having two different names, yet no mention of remarriage.)
I am sure that Rowling's "explanations" are tongue-in-cheek and mainly for publicity value. Presumably Ms. Traister's article is in the same spirit.
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Dumbledore! the good fairy!
Jo has given the world this wonderful parallel universe, and it is amazing how minds, young and old, enjoy slipping into it! How do you spell "apparate"? Ms. Traister has made some good points. I put off reading the last epilogue chapter: "Nineteen Years Later"... until well beyond the release date read fest, for the precise reason that the plot resolutions presented in the book took time for me to digest, and I feared disappointment in her version of the aftermath!!!! We all, like Ms. Traister, have filled in a lot of blanks!!! Connected a lot of dots! ....And. My gosh, what a huge meal to digest at one sitting!!
But her grand cosmology being released in our minds, has long been the fodder for the amazing phenom of fan fiction... and so she acknowledges and appreciates to some extent! So we all have our own ideas about where these people should go in life, like the fan fiction, some maybe erotic behavior and if Harry is an Aurer now, who knows.... he may have to teach defense againgst the dark arts if another dark wizard arises to take over wizard-dom... and the Order of the Phoenix is re-born. And, also, there is much fan fiction to satisfy the gay crowd, who probably figured out about Albus a long time ago!!!!!