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Message from discussion Harry Potters Birthday?
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Tennant Stuart  
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 More options Nov 13 2002, 10:30 pm
Newsgroups: alt.fan.harry-potter
From: Tennant Stuart <tenn...@argonet.co.uk>
Date: Wed, 13 Nov 2002 18:09:52 GMT
Local: Wed, Nov 13 2002 1:09 pm
Subject: Re: Harry Potters Birthday?
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In article <aqs6dp$r8...@news1.radix.net>,

dicc...@radix.net (Richard Eney) wrote:
> In article <3dd168a...@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com>,
> Ben Goudie <b_...@tiscali.co.uk> wrote:
>> from the date of Nearly Headless Nick's death, celebrated with his
>> somethingty-hundredth deathday in book 2, The second book was set
>> in 1992.
> Five hundredth, he says, but we know Nick's a social climber.
> I think he's lost track and is hoping nobody will notice as he
> adjusts the date to whatever is convenient for him.

Indeedy, it could well be that Nearly Headless Nick is lying, especially
since in PS-07 he tells Harry that he hasn't eaten for nearly 400 years;
but fortunately for us, that doesn't matter, since we don't care when he
actually lived & died, all we want is the current year for Book #2.

In CoS-08, NHN says "this Halloween will be my five hundredth deathday"
while the icing on his cake says "Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington died
31st October, 1492" which makes the current year 1992.

If NHN lied in CoS-08 and told the truth in PS-07, then what he should
have said (assuming he'd been dead for 398 years 10 months in Book #1)
is "this Halloween will be my four hundredth deathday" and the icing on
his cake should have said "Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington died 31st
October, 1592", which still makes the current year 1992.

The same argument applies (only more strongly) if NHN told the truth in
both books, and it was JKR who was inconsistent in her writing.

>> However, subsequent references to popular culture have contradicted
>> this a little.  I'd say JK'd be foolish to put in anything that ties
>> it in to any definitely specific year, as this would mean it would
>> clearly be set in the past for anyone who tries to read the books
>> in, say, 10 years time.
> It's already set in the past, from that Deathday date.  Harry starts
> at Hogwarts in 1991, he'll start his seventh year in 1997 and leave
> Hogwarts in 1998, end of series.

That's right, Tamar. JKR first thought of Harry Potter in 1990, and did
most of her plotting for all 7 books in the following few years, (click
on http://www.geocities.com/aberforths_goat/ and check out the absorbing
article "August_1997_Elisabeth_Dunn_The_Daily_Telegraph"), so 1992 could
easily have been when she first thought of NHN's 500th deathday party.

Tennant Stuart

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