Halloween

[Evil Wizard Petting Zoo]

I was thinking about good ol' HP last night and this came to me. The stimulus of the major plot of each book occurs on Halloween:

SS/PS: The troll is let in so Quirrell can go try to get past Fluffy.
CoS: Harry hears the basillisk saying the "rip tear kill stuff"
PoA: Sirius Black gets into Hogwarts
GoF: The champions are chosen, including Harry
OoTP: I haven't really looked yet so if anyone can find it that would save me some trouble

Also, isn't Halloween the day Voldemort came into Godric's Hollow and murdered Harry's parents and Harry got rid of Voldy? I always wondered why Harry wasn't all extra-sad and depressed on Halloween seeing as it's the anniversary of his parents death, and why people aren't all congradulatory towards him because its also the anniversary of Voldy going away. McGonnigal said in SS/PS that "today will probably be called Harry Potter Day" but it never was. Maybe after 11 years of Voldy being gone people didn't even want to talk about anything connected with Voldy because of the whole superstitious mentioning-the-name-thing.

Ok I don't really have a theory about all this, I just thought it was very interesting so I hope I haven't stated the obvious for any of you!
But I do think Halloween is a very important symbol in HP seeing as it's when Harry's parents were killed and Voldy almost died.

[Athena Appleton]

I see what you're saying. Halloween is a major holiday to the wizarding world, and major events generally happen on Halloween. Some of those events are planned for Halloween (the choosing of the champions). Also, it seems that both Quirrell and Sirius took advantage of the annual Halloween feast, knowing that there wouldn't be people around asking questions, but that everyone is in one place.

I thought Halloween was the day the DA was formed, but that was the first Saturday in October. I dunno know what the one in OotP is...

[Aberforth]

I hadn't noticed that, good spot. I don't think Halloween is even mentioned in OotP. I have it in a Word document and ran a search for Halloween and it isn't in there. It seems that there is the Hogsmeade visit in October, then there is the quidditch amtch that Haryy, fred and george get banned, Harid comes back and then they're talking about christmas when arthur weasley is attacked. It seems to skip through november quickly too.

October extinguished itself in a rush of howling winds and driving rain and November arrived, cold as frozen iron, with hard irosts every morning and icy draughts that bit at exposed hands and faces.

(Taken from The Lion and the Serpent)

[Athena Appleton]

no WONDER I couldn't find it... I swear, I spent a long time looking between the hog's head chapter and the lion and the serpant chapter for mention of Halloween...

weird...

[Groo]

good observation Evil Wizard.
Can anyone tell me what Halloween is really all about and whether it has major importance in your countries? otherwise i think Rowling must have some personal fascination with Halloween

[Emma'I'm a real witch']

http://wilstar.com/holidays/hallown.htm

This site gives a pretty accurate description of how Halloween started.
Hope this helps.

[Evil Wizard Petting Zoo]

no WONDER I couldn't find it... I swear, I spent a long time looking between the hog's head chapter and the lion and the serpant chapter for mention of Halloween..

Haha, yeah i just went crazy looking for it last night too.

[Athena Appleton]

Today, in the US, Halloween is almost exclusively a kid's holiday, where they get to dress up as princesses and spiderman and go around with little buckets that look like jack-o-lanterns and get tons of candy...

However, if you read up on how it got started, and what it is, you'll see the significance of it in the wizarding world...

[Dumbledores Master]

I wonder what the significance of Halloween will be in the next books

[Nobby]

j/k's playing. i think j/k is moving away from the incidents happening on halloween storylines

[Athena Appleton]

don't confuse me Nobby, I'm slow enough as it is!

j/k = just kidding
j.k. or jk = the name of the author of Harry Potter



and now I have to tend to a screaming kiddo... good day

[Nobby]

hehehe