I'm just reading the latest Harry Potter book (OK, maybe not quit the right forum then), and have come across some Bad Astronomy.

Harry has to take a load of exams, including Astronomy, during the summer term - though it's never made entirely clear why it's important for young witches and wizards to learn astronomy (from the point of view of their magical studies that is).

Anyway, their exams include an astronomy practical which takes place at night and involves identifying and marking the positions of various celestial objects on a star chart and here's the rub; Hogwarts School is about a day's journey by train north of London, putting it somewhere in Northern Scotland. It barely gets dark up there in June, so astronomy, even at 11pm will be a challenge and spotting Venus and Orion, as Harry does, will be nigh on impossible at that time of day/year.

But then he may have a magical telescope (previous homework has included drawing the moons of Jupiter) so what do I know.

I've actually managed to spot stars quite well, even in the outskirts of Edinburgh... I'm sure it would be possible to make out Orion and Venus in somewhere as secluded as Hogwarts.

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No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?

OK, I suppose Orion and Venus are bright enough to be visible through the perpetual twilight of a northern night. But seeing Orion at 11pm in June is a challenge, it being a winter constellation. I'm not sure Venus ever gets far enough from the Sun to be visible after 11pm either, though I grant you that if the sun never gets much below the horizon it could be.

On the night of the practical there is also a bright moon and lots of light visible from the windows of Hogwarts, something one would have thought the astronomy professor would have taken into account with the scheduling since they'd make the practical harder. Unless this is the object of course.

Hogwarts needs not to be half a trainride north from London; considering the train starts from a platform hidden inside a pillar, it could be anywhere (that passage is obviously some dimensional gate or at least a "magic" beaming device )

Here's pretending not to have read the books

jokergirl

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Si tacuisses, philosophus mansisses.

"Half of what I say is meaningless, but I say it so that the other half may reach you."

In fact the station used as Hogwarts was Goathland, it's in the North Yorkshire Moors.

It has also been used for All Creatures Great and Small, Heartbeat, Poirot and Sherlock Holmes.

it's on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, it runs from Pickering on the south of the moors and follows Newtondale across the moors to Goathland where, after passing the summit it descends down a 1 in 49 grade along the valley side to Grosmont its northern terminus.

While they have a shed full of their own steam the loco used in the film was a Great Western 4-6-0 imported for the filming.

Goathland is used in a lot of period films as it hasn't changed since tit was built by the victorians, it has all it's original North Eastern Railway slotted post signals and interiors.

I live just over the moors and visit quite a lot.

Unfortunately the village of Goathland itself is a nightmare since it became 'Aidesnfield' the setting of the popular 'heartbeat' drama set in the 60s. On a typical summer weekend there are around 40 coachloads of visitors swarming all over.

Notable features of the line include the aforementioned grade, the worlds oldest purpose built railway tunnel and an embankment 'floating' across a swamp, the line deflects by up to 4 inches as a train passes over.

http://www.nymr.demon.co.uk/main/home_1.htm

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But Hogwarts itself is clearly on a magical island in Loch Eilt (NW Highlands) although I believe the cloisters are in Durham .

Because Hogwarts is their only school. It's not in addition to some sort of normal school. Notice they also have classes like "Arithmancy" that probably teach basic math skills along with the spells. One wonders if tensors come into play at any point.

So along with the magic they need to learn the Three R's, but such things seem well integrated into the general curriculum.

Or I could be over analyzing.

At least it isn't pirate school. There they'd need to learn the Three "Arrrs".

Y'arr, bad puns rolling in off the starboard bow...

Hmm, I could always test this next year, if someone sends me a reminder...

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No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?

Of course, Arithmancy is an elective so one assumes it is advanced andthat Harry and Ron have thier basic math down already.

That being said, there is at least one non-spellcasting class. Proffesors Blinn's (tedious) history class.

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Carl Matherly

Offical Battlestar Galactica Apologist

Named Time Magazine's 2006 "Person of the Year"

I've read 'em all, don't care what folks say. They have been my favorite books ever. I told my son over and over, nah, I don't want to read them. Then we got one as a book on tape. I listened to about 20 minutes of it and went back and started the series from the beginning.

But I'm not up to summer school yet in The Order of the Phoenix so I better stay away from this thread until I finish.

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Democracy Now! - The lost art of investigative news reporting.

In the second book Ron and Harry get to Hogwarts in a flying car - about as fast as a train, and without any dimensional gates. So yes, Hogwarts is somewhere on the British Isles.

I'm with you beskeptical. I didn't want to read that "brain candy" either, but I loved 'em. My son, who's doing research in astropysics, waited in line to buy the fifth book as soon as it came out. Sometimes you just gotta let go and enjoy a good story.

oh i dont care what people think either. I love the books too. They are great reads. Very entertaining and amazing characters and stories. The world she has created is asmazing too. AFter these 7 books i will be very, very surprised if she or someone else does not start some offshoot books about different characters or places.


Even tought i wish she got the next book out next week, i hope she works hard on it and makes it worth the wait. I don't want to read a book that was bannged out to make a quick buck. I have read those (the horrible Prey by chrichton) and it makes the author look money hungry.

--Points and shakes finger at Jokergirl, Beskeptical, Humphrey and Gethen, and Ilya--
HAA! AAH! YOU READ HARRY POTTER!
--Shakes finger some more--
AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!
--Runs--

I'm so cool that sometimes I give myself freezer burn! 8)

ZING! \/

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"...bartenders and shiny stuff and dreams are made of stooped necromancers he seems like a banana wrist having strayed too close to the constellations on their shaved skulls. The rain of frogs ended and a rain of blood comes down. "

I read the Harry Potter books, but only for the food scenes. In Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone the first description of a banquet at Hogwarts sent me straight to the refrigerator. In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the description of a table groaning under the weight of the food didn't help matters. Harry Potter 6 will probably disable me and Harry Potter 7 will finish me off. I know I shouldn't read them, but I can't help myself.

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Life is like a box of chocolates. All of your choices are bad for you.

rofl Chuck.

Not an expert here but isn't Hogwarts kind of located as you say it should be, but in another dimension? After all, one has to slip through a brick wall at the train station and catch a train nobody can see from the previous...ummm... manifestation of existence ... as it were. So maybe it gets dark sooner there despite the location. Everything seems topsy-turvy there anyway. :wink:

So what happens when you read about the rather, uh, unusually flavored candies? I seem to recall an earwax flavor and a booger flavor. Never mind. I guess I don't wanna know. :wink:

Weird candy was a direct rip from Monty Python.

Crunchy Frog?

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Umm!!!! Crunchy Frog! How about a nice Cockroach Cluster or Anthrax Ripple?

Finished the book. Whaaaaaa ! It's over. Whaaaaaa ! I'm ready for the next one. How many years will I have to wait?

OK, as to the night sky, they did make it clear that they had to wait a while until dark. Here in Seattle we are about at the same parallel as the southern tip of England. It gets dark enough for star observations by 11 or so at night. So maybe they stayed up until midnight. My 14 year old certainly does. :roll:

Acusing JK of stealing material? Come on, every writer has life experiences that show up in their material. The HP stories are written by an incredibly talented writer who has produced incredibly original scenes in her books. So Monty Python mentioned boogars and/or something akin to Bernie Botts Every Flavored Beans. HP stories are massively popular because they are such great stories and full of very imaginative scenes.

Mr. X, you are missing a wonderful 'escape the world' fantasy. You should try the books on tape while commuting if you have a commute to work. It does wonders for stress. Until the story runs out that is. Whaaaaaa ! It's over. Whaaaaaa !

(I'm a girl, I'm allowed to cry and to enjoy children's books without repercussions. That's one benefit anyway. :wink: )

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Indeed! And one of the advantages of being a parent is I can say that I'm checking the book out to make sure it's okay for my sprog; aren't I a good responsible parent. It's also a good excuse for renting Miyazaki films and otherwise indulging in G-rated media.

So, beskep and Ab, I suggest that, in the interests of your children's development, you also check out The Thief of Always by Clive Barker, who usually writes for adults (horror and such) but has penned at least one book for young readers. I would really hate for your offspring to read this one withut your having carefully examined it first. :wink:

With that recommendation, Gethen, I will have to read that book.

Spirited Away was an incredible animation masterpiece, Ab_. I loved it. We actually bought the Japanese version with English subtitles before the American version was released.

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Democracy Now! - The lost art of investigative news reporting.

some of the books that helped my transition from kiddie books to full fleged novels was the junior fiction of the likes of Heinlen and Christopher Pike. I highly suggest them to anyone with late elementry school aged kids. or younger. :-)

I still remeber sititng in my parents bedroom on the couch reading Christopher pike (teenage dramas and a few horror) while my mom read her big novels. :-) Good memories.


(Just don't tell them you love to read it too at your age. I will then become uncool. :-P )


I lliked the 5th harry potter. But my favorite is still the 4th book. Hopefully the 5th book still deals alot with hogwarts school. Those are my favorite parts when she describes the school and classes itself. :-)

Being Clive Barker, I'll definitely have to check it out first. My spawn really enjoyed Michael Chabon's Summerland (fantasy and baseball! It's a winner!) Carl Hiaasen's Hoot is also on my check-out list; I really like his other works, but I don't think of him as a kid-friendly writer by any stretch of the imagination.

Humphrey, I tried Heinlein on her (specifically Farmer in the Sky), but she was turned off by the total lack of useful female characters. Wonder how that happened. (Note: She's 10 now. I'll try it again in a year or two, see if that makes a difference.)

beskeptical: I've long been a Miyazaki fan, from Nausicaa on; Spirited Away was the only movie we went to multiple times in the theater this year. (My husband and daughter went three times. Darn it, I had to work that last time.)

Several of heinlens later "Adult" novels have strong female leads, but those are very "adult". You might want to try "have spacesuit, will travel. " if i remeber right, that has a strong female lead.

The spawn got about half-way through that one before bogging down. Right now we've started her on Madeline L'Engel, which she is enjoying. Maybe she's just not ready for hard SF... how did I have a fantasy fan? How? (I read fantasy, SF, mystery, non-fiction, anything that doesn't move too fast and has print on it.)

Schmitz has strong female characters. Piper's fun, but if she wants a female lead she's probably out of luck.

The title character of Podkayne of Mars, by Heinlein, is female.