J.K. Rowling "outs" Hogwarts character

[Paxton]

Harry Potter fans, the rumors are true: Albus Dumbledore, master wizard and Headmaster of Hogwarts, is gay. J.K. Rowling, author of the mega-selling fantasy series that ended last summer, outed the beloved character Friday night while appearing before a full house at Carnegie Hall.

After reading briefly from the final book, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," she took questions from audience members.

She was asked by one young fan whether Dumbledore finds "true love."

"Dumbledore is gay," the author responded to gasps and applause.

She then explained that Dumbledore was smitten with rival Gellert Grindelwald, whom he defeated long ago in a battle between good and bad wizards. "Falling in love can blind us to an extent," Rowling said of Dumbledore's feelings, adding that Dumbledore was "horribly, terribly let down."

Dumbledore's love, she observed, was his "great tragedy."

"Oh, my god," Rowling concluded with a laugh, "the fan fiction."

Potter readers on fan sites and elsewhere on the Internet have speculated on the sexuality of Dumbledore, noting that he has no close relationship with women and a mysterious, troubled past. And explicit scenes with Dumbledore already have appeared in fan fiction.

Rowling told the audience that while working on the planned sixth Potter film, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," she spotted a reference in the script to a girl who once was of interest to Dumbledore. A note was duly passed to director David Yates, revealing the truth about her character.

Rowling, finishing a brief "Open Book Tour" of the United States, her first tour here since 2000, also said that she regarded her Potter books as a "prolonged argument for tolerance" and urged her fans to "question authority."

Not everyone likes her work, Rowling said, likely referring to Christian groups that have alleged the books promote witchcraft. Her news about Dumbledore, she said, will give them one more reason.

 

[Kigan2006]

This took me a bit by surprise. I had considered the possibility, but never thought it would turn out to be reality.

Though in a way I'm also not surprised. She never struck me as one to follow authority quietly. Questioning it seems to be part of her nature.

 

[luminum]

I'm so thrilled by this. I knew it! Woo hoo! Yay <3

Poor Dumbledore...

Here's another link to the Newsweek version:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/50787

 

[Pushyourluck]

I've never read her books or will ever read them but FUCK the religious groups. I'm glad she's made so much money from the fact that she's wrote a fictitious book and that STILL gets on the christians nerves. The bible is complete fiction, I just hope more people come to believe in Harry Potter over the years than they do the bible.

 

[luminum]

Cowardice If You Ask Me. Nice For Her To Reveal That One Of Her Characters Is Gay - AFTER The Fact. Heaven Forbid She Had The Courage To Reveal The Truth Early On - But For The Sake Of Book Sales She Kept Mum.

It Should Have Been Obvious From The Start And Revealed In The Book As Such.

She could have done absolutely nothing at all.

Fans felt there were inklings...the fact that Dumbledore wasn't close with any particular women even though he was in such a powerful position...that he never mentioned any love lives...that he was such good friends with only one person who was a guy in his youth...

It has to be more than a recent afterthought, too since the article states that she reviewed the script for the sixth movie (which has to have been written at least a year ago if not more) and nixed the reference to a girl by telling the writer that Dumbledore is gay. So if it didn't make it into the book, at least she had been thinking about it in his characterization long before her talk at Carnegie Hall.

Likewise, many of the things she's talked about after the book are earnest resolutions about the characters that just never made it in. What happened to Luna, Neville, etc. are all things that were revealed in greater detail with her talks to fans and it doesn't detract and neither should this bit of information.

It's not a retcon, because there's no evidence in the books that would disprove it, and as a character, Dumbledore doesn't need close relationship ties to anyone other than Harry and Snape until book 7, in which you learn more about him.

 

[Pringle]

Well I don't think it was up to her to out him - he should come out in his own time and only if he is comfortable enough to do it . . . .

. . . wait - I'm taking it too serious aren't I

 

[pausanias_usa]

Wonder how the dead actor who originally played him would have reacted to the news. . . .

 

[BigDestiny]

Honestly, I'm massively relieved to hear this. I was worried so long (and so badly, I didn't even speak of it) about the fact that there didn't seem to be any gay characters, despite the fact that the series literally has 'a cast of thousands'. I didn't know why, and was afraid to ask, because I didn't want to consider the possibility that JK Rowling could be homophobic. I'm glad to see that she is in fact the opposite. Not only a main character, but the most powerful one in the series, is one of us. What a great role model.

As far as not saying anything, I'm not really surprised. Besides the negative reaction from her critics, she has to know most people (gay or straight) don't want to hear about old people having sex.

 

[luminum]

No man, Rowling describes her self as very very liberal Woot!

As for dead actors, I doubt he would have reacted as badly as say, Charlton Heston and the revelation that Ben Hur and the main baddy had a relationship in their youth.

 

[breathe_no_more]

The people who hated the books for promoting witch craft definitly have another reason to hate the books now haha.

 

[Paws]

She was asked by one young fan whether Dumbledore finds "true love."

"Dumbledore is gay," the author responded to gasps and applause.

So according to her, gays can't find true love? Or why isn't she just answering the question with a yes or no?

 

[loppyears]

Wow, never saw it coming. I guess it didn't have anything to do with the main story, but I wonder why she didn't tell us in the books? It would be good if they manage to show this in the next film/s but I can't see that happening....

Now I'm waiting for JK to announce Voldemort was a drag queen!

 

[Irish Queer]

Cowardice If You Ask Me. Nice For Her To Reveal That One Of Her Characters Is Gay - AFTER The Fact. Heaven Forbid She Had The Courage To Reveal The Truth Early On - But For The Sake Of Book Sales She Kept Mum.

It Should Have Been Obvious From The Start And Revealed In The Book As Such.

I love these types of arguements. Let's face it the books are about Harry and specifically Harry. We didn't get a hint of Dumbledore as a person until the end. The only teacher to me who didn't appeared asexual was Snape as we knew who he truely loved. I thought after reading the back story in my head that Dumbledore maybe gay but I didn't carea t the end of the day the story was more important than who loved who.

 

[luminum]

So according to her, gays can't find true love? Or why isn't she just answering the question with a yes or no?

No, what she continues to say is that he did fall in love...with Grindewald and when he realized what a terrible person Grindewald was, it hurt him. He loved him and was crushed by the kind of person he turned out to be. Dumbledore's love was tragic. For an author who considers herself very very liberal and who has chosen to make one of the most respected, beloved, and powerful characters in one of the most famous fictional series ever a gay man shows a lot about what she thinks about gay men. I don't think that the fact that she answered it that way or that his love was a tragic one is in any way a statement against gay men.

Here's a transcript of her entire Q&A session and you can tell from a lot of her responses that her belief is that just because you love somebody doesn't mean everything's okay (Dumbledore and Snape questions) and that she believes that her books are about ending bigotry and promoting tolerance (Nazi Regime question).

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2...neville-marries-hannah-abbott-and-scores-more

 

[Kigan2006]

It is true, she really didn't explore the lives of most of the surrounding characters, ESPECIALLY Dumbledore.

As an aspiring writer myself, I noticed that but I also noticed it didn't really take away from the experience. But throwing information like Dumbledore's sexuality out after the fact does take away from the experience because she could have explored that at least a little in the books.

A lot of character development is incomplete in her books, but as I said it only takes away from it when she starts explaining things after the fact.

 

[luminum]

And That Is A Major Problem With The Series. Any Creative Writing 101 Course Will Emphasize The Need To Fully Explore The Lives Of The Surrounding Characters In Their Compliment To The Main Character. It's What Gives Texture And Life To The Story. Many Beginning Writers Fall Into The Mistake Of Concentrating Only On Their Main Character. To Do So Leaves Us With A Story Half Told.

If Rowlings Were Making A Social/Political Statement By Outing Dumbledore - Then My Argument Is That It Should Have Been Done Clearly And Openly In The Book. The Lesson Of Harry's Admiration And Acceptance Of A Gay Mentor Is Something That Cannot Be Minimized. New Readers Will Not Have A Clear Statement In Text That Points To Dumbledore's Sexuality. And Therefore Unless They Hear It From Others - It Is An Important Lesson Lost.

Rowlings Cowardice Still Stands. It Is True Luminum She Could Have Done Nothing At All - But With Billions In The Bank - She Has Nothing To Lose By Revealing What She Had Known All Along. And By Remaining Silent She Would Have Left Dumbledore's Character Development Incomplete. It Is A Shame She Didn't Inform Us In The Book Earlier & Openly - Rather Than Providing This Important Piece Of Information As A Footnote.

It's not a failing. Rowling explores the lives of almost every secondary character in relation to the main character. The reason why Dumbledore's backround is unexplored for the first six books is to maintain the mystery and use that mystery as a plot device for the last book. One of the subplots of the seventh book is about Harry realizing that he knows next to nothing about who Dumbledore was aside from being his headmaster and pseudo-guardian. He spends the rest of the book learning more and more about his mentor as a human being. He questions whether or not Dumbledore was as shining of an example as he always believed (sic "questioning authority") and understands that in the end, his mentor was a human being with flaws such as being blinded by love. The whole theme of the last book is about growing as an adult and having the maturity to question previous assumptions and reformulate one's beliefs. The world is not divided into good and evil (like in Snape's case) or perfect and ruinous (like Dumbledore's case). If Dumbledore's ife story had been upfront throughout the seven books, there would be no theme to explore in the last one and there would be no mystery and what the reader and Harry perceives Dumbledore to be would lack the need for reanalysis and confrontation.

She's not pulling his sexuality out of her ass just because she has nothing to lose. She says she's always considered him to be this way and that when she had to analyze the script for the sixth movie, she explicitly had to remove references that would indicate that he was heterosexual. That's at least a year or two ago considering the fact that they were already shooting the next movie when the 5th one came out.

And if you consider the fact that she was explicit in the books (and the fact that the only source for Harry's information about him was woefully biased and inaccurate--Rita Skeeter--or riddled with bitterness--Aberforth) that it would make no sense, then it would have been an example of poor writing. "The Loves of Albus Dumbledore" never figure into what Harry needs from him or into Dumbledore's duties while he was alive. In fact, only when Dumbledore is no longer helpful (i.e. dead) and Harry must discover himself without his mentor to guide him do the revelations of his mentor's past become useful. The complete characterization of Albus Dumbledore is there in the seventh book and the signs of him being gay are there for the perceptive reader. The fact that it is never explicitly stated is just as well, since Dumbledore is no more a sexual character than Cornelius Fudge or Minerva McGonagall. When someone inquired about his sexual/romantic life, that's when she gave the answer and that would be the same if someone asked if another character whose love life was unimportant to the main story such as, say, Professor Flitwick ever fell in love.

Great literature that young readers follow has hardly been explicit about it's homosexual relationships. Gene and Phinny in A Separate Peace are never explicitly stated to have homo-eroticism between them. Great film is the same way. Ben Hur, Spartacus, Rebecca are all examples of films where the homo-sexuality of characters were never explicitly stated, but noticeable nonetheless. Some readers of Harry Potter were picking up on the clues, just as one might pick up on them for your average person. Dumbledore was a man of great influence, who had no close ties with any woman, who never expressed any desire for ties with any particular woman, and whose only remarkably friendship was with another boy in his adolescence.

If you think that she had nothing to lose by telling this after the seventh book, think about if she really stood to lose anything by telling it in the seventh. It's the last book. If she put it in there and people read that "Dumbledore is gay," it's too late--they already bought the book and the money is in her pocket. Even if word spreads, do you think a die-hard Harry Potter fan is going to think, "Well, since I heard a bit of information about a character I love in the last book, the series of which I've invested years of dedication to, I guess I'll not buy it..."? People would have bought the books whether it was in the last one explicitly or not. She didn't stand to lose anything by making it ridiculously obvious in book seven just as she didn't stand to lose anything by mentioning it later. There's no cowardice there.

What she stands to lose now is some of her audience for the next two movies. That's still money that she could be making and that she stands to lose from this. So what would be more "cowardly": telling people now or telling them 3 years from now after the seventh movie is released?

 

[Mitsukuni]

Yay for JK!!!!

 

[Epica75]

who cares.

really.

It's not even a real person. It's a character.

Second of all, she did it while answering a question about the story. .. without making a fuss of it. BRAVO on that. If she wanted to OUT a character and sell stuff, she would have called a friggin' press conference, and i would have still applauded her.. Money rules.

lol


but she didn't do that.. that should have been my end of sentence.. for all the liberal tree hugging leftwingers.

 

[-Lance-]

It's awesome that the smartest man in the series was infact a homo.

Dumbledore is my second fav character, first being sirius.

 

[Diodorus]

This is so funny...Can you imagine how many parents are going to be pissed off because she did that?