She could have easily done it during the last book by having Harry watching some decent Dumbledore/Grindelwald interaction in a pensive. DH was such a turnover concerning Dumbledore that there wouldn't have been any problems to include this.

This 'spontaneous' statement just leaves a bad aftertaste.

Concerning storyline and fanfiction it would have been "better" if she would have answered "He adored Minerva McGonagall (blablabla) but he never revealed his feelings, and neither did she."

 

Another way it could have come out would have been through Rita's book. Have old Elphias let slip something that Albus once told him during a bout of teenage drinking or somesuch...

 

I think she could have done it quite tastefully (well, this is a subjective measure, but anyway...) - something as simple as Aberforth making a reference to Albus ripping up a letter and tossing it in the fireplace after the fight leading to Ariana's death.

I hesitate to attribute such cynical motives to JKR ("poisoning the well", etc), but given the necessarily ambivalent relationship authors have to fanfiction writers (after all, fanfic writers inevitably will write storylines or use characters in directions the author disapproves of on any number of grounds), she may very well have thought of trying to tie everything up in a bow with a dash of controversy to keep fanfiction writers from going off in too many directions she might not like.

As for the question of someone "writing a sequel", wouldn't that technically be a derivative work and thus in violation of copyright?

 

When it enters public domain, things change.

 

Point taken. However I think that it would likely fall flat, as there's intangible factors associated with the success of an original series due to the time period they're written in. If someone were to write a sequel years from now, they wouldn't write quite the same way and would introduce contemporary references in allegorical fashion that would be jarring when comparing to the original seven books.

Nonetheless as suethors have shown us, even dreck gets an audience of some sort.

 

LOL. I know this kind of thing was going to happen anyway, interview or no interview, but... Lulz. This one actually was written because of the interview. My favorite part is where the 'author' says that they know it sucks but asks for reviews anyway.

Welcome to the desert of the real...

 

Who names an owl "Fudge"? Sheesh.

 

My own username was meant to facetiously reference all of the Albus Severus/Scorpius ships that seem to be spontaneously flaming on over at FF.Net. But for the namesake of Harry's youngest to have yanked on Grindelwald's Elder Wand?

I didn't see this one coming, even when he wore that plum-colored suit on the way to the orphanage.

 

In fairness, I think any wizard who has been in prolonged lack of contact with the Muggle world would dress weirdly. Although plum is a rather, er, indicative color.

 

I agree with Bio, she did this purely for political gains and I frankly think it sucks. Somethings are meant to be left out of politics and by doing this she just ruined the whole thing, no to mention the fact that she butchered an amazing character.

What really annoys me above all is the fact that she spews this shit when all the books are done, whats the point of that? it just detracts from the story.

In the article it talks about how gay rights activists are pleased about the outcome, WTF? its fucking fiction books, are they that desperate for recognition that they are pleased when it happens in fiction?

The more i think about it the more disgusted i become towards Rowling.
Great going bitch.

 

My issues with this:

1.) It reduces Dumbledore to a cliche.

2.) It looks, smells, and feels like a cheap marketing ploy.

3.) BP already covered most of my other positions on the issue . . .

 

personally if she wanted to make a statement about gay people she should have done the following:
a) use a char who is not above 50 years old
b) include the fact that the char is gay in the friggin books

and no, that doesn't mean that she should write explicit sex, but if it was done in the book it would have been a statement for tolerance, the way she did it in her interview it's a cry for attention....

 

I don't think we need to worry about explicit slash between Grindelwald and Dumbledore. Just because Dumbledore is gay doesn't mean that Grindelwald is gay.

I am going to flame these bitches. When some slasher is ten chapters into her story, they'll realize that they've been writing an AU, and that their revolutionary history of Albus Dumbledore can't be taken seriously.

 

I don't think I've ever laughed so hard in my life as when I read the interview. Dumbledore's sexuality is the very LAST thing I want to know about. Remus, Sirius, anyone under the age of 50, and I may have been interested. Seriously, the man was over 100. At that point he wouldn't have been able to do anything anyway.

Having said that, I do agree that this is just a stupid plan of J.K.'s to keep interest in the books, and that it just serves to validate a ridiculous cliche. *shakes head* She should have just kept her damn mouth shut or done it properly in the book.


On a side note, I would like to mention that being a homosexual and being a pedophile are two SEPARATE things that can, but do not necessarily go hand in hand. I think a couple of people may be confused about this.

 

Quoted for truth.

With that said, Eromenos! Harry slash-fiction will be fun to write (has already written 'The Office').

 

There are may things already said that I think are true. This titbit of information has absolutely no meaning to the HP series. I mean so he was gay... he's also over 100 yrs old, which means he probably hasn't had a woody in over 40 yrs.

The thing that annoys me though is the way she introduced this concept. It was so abrupt that it almost sound like she was making it up on the spot, most likely to sell more books in among the gay community, or be more hip.
She needs to sit down and think of better ways to expand the HP world than come up with half-assed things like this.

 

We'll know if she put more thought into it than just this sort of spur of the moment thing, if someone leaks the working drafts of the HBP movie scripts which prove that JKR had this in mind for Dumbledore all along and didn't just come up with it after she finished creating fanon fodder for AD/GG fan fics with some of the subtext in TDH.

 

LOL at the above picture.

The reason as to why she didn't write it in the books? Simply because she had never considered doing so while writing the books. As Gio/Bioplague stated, this was just a cheap marketing ploy to continue generating interest as well as her poor attempt at a political statement.

She had never once intended for Dumbledore to be gay in the series, and it shows. Read the books; canon will back me up on this. Which is why I refuse to accept this as canon.

This is simply something done on the spur after the series is completed.