Happy Birthday, Cindy!

Jo's Harvard 2008 Commencement Address

As many of you know, JK Rowling was awarded an honorary doctor of letters degree by Harvard University and addressed the Harvard University Class of 2008. Her words were of an unspeakable elegance and wisdom and are available on the Harvard University website here.

Thanks to Harvard, '11 student (and good friend to this reporter) John for the heads up!

MMap Hunt Closing!

We have received a number of eager applications for the position of news poster and we will begin the selection process from applications received by 11:59:59pm tonight (Friday, June 6). Those who make it through to phase two of the selection stage will be notified next week.

MMap on the Hunt!

Marauders' Map is currently looking for a few articulate individuals to smooth the flow of news on the site by helping to locate and post news articles! Full training of our news database will be supplied as will a mini-handbook with procedures that MMap follows when writing news articles.

If interested, please send an email to brendan [at] marauders-map [dot] org with the following information:

Name
Age
State/Province and Country of residence
Primary Language
Email Address/Messaging information.

We will select from the applications we receive and contact a few for writing samples!

New Scene in Half-Blood Prince

We're back! I'm currently in the process of waking my staff back up from vacation, but the news that reached the Marauders' Map staff today warranted us re-opening.

Apparently, producer David Barron has confirmed that there will be a new scene in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince that was not originally in the book. The scene will feature The Burrow and will capture the feeling that no one is safe while the dark lord roams. The scene will occur in the middle of the movie to capture the various scenes throughout the book that show reports of tragedy caused by Voldemort that the public passes off as simple disasters as these scenes would be difficult to incorporate in the film.

HPANA has the full article here.

Holiday Hiatus

Marauders' Map will be shutting down from now until a little after the New Year as the staff takes a much needed break for the holidays. The site will still be accessible but there will be no real new content until after the New Year starts. We will pick up again on January 2, 2008 with some brand-new and some dated Half-Blood Prince movie news.

Happy Christmachanakwanzaka!

Heyman's Smart!

The list of the fifty smartest people in Hollywood was released earlier from Entertainment Weekly placing Harry Potter producer David Heyman at number nine!

MA School Bans Harry Potter

It is well-known to the fandom, and indeed to Jo herself that there are many groups that oppose her work with the idea that it promotes witchcraft and sorcery. Last month, Reverend Ronald Barker, pastor of St. Joseph Parish School in Wakefield, Massachusetts, pulled the Harry Potter series off the shelves of the Catholic school's library. In an interview with Channel 5 (ABC) News, Barker had this to say:

"There might be one or two that might be influenced, that might be susceptible to doing things not proper spiritually, so I said 'Let's ban Harry Potter.'"

This, coming just after Rowling announced that Albus Dumbledore is gay, seems too timely for Dumbledore's sexuality to not factor in this decision, but Barker says he made this decision long before Rowling's announcement.

This is the first school in liberal Massachusetts to ban the books from the shelves. The Archdiocese of Boston says they have no standard as to how the Harry Potter should be treated and is therefore left to the discretion of their congregation.

You can see the full interview with Channel 5 here.

Brendan's $0.02: This, ironically, is the elementary/middle school that I graduated from in 2003 in my hometown. Fr. Ron was not the pastor while I was there and we were free, and even encouraged to read the book as we wished. I remember my fifth grade teacher at St. Joe's actually read us an article on the fourth book being published from Scholastic. My, how times change.

Dumbledore!

In a recent book signing interview author JK Rowling revealed some new - and, for some fans, potentially controversial - information about one of her most beloved characters.
We have long known that Rowling has developed personal histories for each of her characters, having far more information than the frame of the novels ever allowed her to fully explore. In the case of many of the adult characters, these back stories often involve their personal lives, stories of their time outside the walls of Hogwarts. Such is the case here.
According to an article from Yahoo!News Rowling was asked if Dumbledore ever found true love. Her response? His great love was Grindelwald, his rival wizard. "Dumbledore is gay."
Also, according to the same article, Rowling "said that she regarded her Potter books as a 'prolonged argument for tolerance' and urged her fans to 'question authority.'"


BECCA'S COMMENTARY: We here at MMap are thrilled by this latest revelation and could not agree more with the notion of the novels as an extended message about the power of tolerance and acceptance. If possible, JK Rowling (and Dumbledore, too) have just climbed a little bit higher on our personal list of heroes.

Harry's Wondrous Summer Part II

I think I deserve a prize for winning my second consecutive battle with a podcast episode! After a couple months of waiting, the second part in the four part HWS podcast series is available for download through iTunes.

Marauding the Map Episode 2.2:
Harry's Wondrous Summer, Part II
MMap Interviews on NECN

Part two of Harry's Wondrous Summer is a special video release of Marauders' Map's appearance on New England Cable News on July 16, 2007. In it Brendan discusses mild predictions of Deathly Hallows and some brief thoughts on the Order of the Phoenix movie.

The episode can be downloaded by right (or control) clicking the link below and saving it to your computer. We recommend subscribing to the podcast by clicking the subscribe button in the top right hand corner of the site (just under the apple icon announcing this episode's arrival).

Marauding the Map Episode 2.1
HWS Part 2 - MMap Interviews on NECN
[53.5 MB; 4 minutes, 37 seconds]

US OotP DVD Release Date

We have received word that the US Edition of the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix DVD will be released on December 11, 2007. As we reported earlier, the UK version of the film will be released on November 12.