J.K. Rowling's The Decline of Civilization Pt. 1: The Return of the Death Eaters
Written: May 19 '03 (Updated Jul 21 '09)
Product Rating:
Pros: A Brilliant & Ambitious Masterpiece from J.K. Rowling.
Cons: None.
The Bottom Line: Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire is a wonderful and ambitious book that leaves things wide open for the next part of J.K. Rowling's series.
thevoid99's Full Review: J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fir...
With nearly a month away from the release of the year’s most anticipated book, J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter is set to return in the fifth book of the series called Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix. The anticipation concerning the fifth book has already made fans hungry for the release as in Britain, thieves try to steal copies of the fifth book but ended up getting caught while some try to release fake version of the book. Already being touted from a few people, who read the book, as a darker, more emotional-driven story than all the previous books, Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix is already breaking pre-sales records as the date of June 21, 2003 is drawing closer. Fans are already going back to the previous books for clues that might be revealed for the fifth book. The one book fans are going back to is the fourth book, Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire that contained many things that lead up to the events in book 5. Before we get to Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire, we will return to the previous books that lead up to the events of The Goblet of Fire that might contain some importance to the storylines in The Order of the Phoenix.
***WARNING: THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPHS WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS OF THE PREVIOUS BOOKS. FOR THOSE WHO HAVEN’T READ THE BOOKS AND DON’T WANT TO KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON. SKIP THEM UNTIL THE “END SPOILER” SECTION.***
In the first book, Harry Potter & the Sorcerer/Philosopher’s Stone, Harry arrives at the Hogwarts School of Wizardy & Witchcraft where he finds friends in Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger and school gamekeeper Hagrid, as well as enemies in Draco Malfoy and Potions master Professor Snape. Harry begins to suspect a teacher who was trying to steal the Sorcerer’s Stone, a stone that will make you immortal, and learns the teacher was stealing the stone for Lord Voldemort, the dark wizard who killed his parents and tried to kill him when he was baby but was thwarted by the baby who became the Boy Who Lived. Harry stops Voldemort from trying to steal the stone as the school headmaster, Professor Dumbledore, decided to destroy the stone so Voldemort cannot go back to Hogwarts.
In Harry Potter & the Chamber of Secrets, Harry learns the secret power Lord Voldemort had transferred him, the night he tried to kill him. Harry uses the Parseltongue spell, the ability to talk to snakes, to open the Chamber of Secret where he learned that Voldemort was once called Tom Riddle, who is also the heir of Salazar Slytherin. Riddle comes back in the form of a diary, that was slipped into Ron’s sister Ginny’s cauldron on a day in Diagon Alley by Lucius Malfoy, and Harry stops Riddle from killing students with a giant snake called a Basilik. Dumbledore tells Harry that he had the qualities Salazar Slytherin had but used them for good which helped make him pull the old sword that once belonged to the schoolhouse Harry stays in Hogwarts, Godric Gryffindor.
In Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry learns a convict named Sirius Black had escaped the treacherous wizard prison of Azkaban to go after him. He was rumored to be Voldemort’s second-in-command as well as the secret-keeper to Harry’s parents. Harry also learned that Black was his godfather and his father’s best friend. Frightened by Black, death omens, and soul-sucking, black-hooded creatures called Dementors, Harry’s third year in Hogwarts was difficult and emotionally draining. On the last day of his exams, Harry is shocked when his Divination teacher, Professor Trelawney goes into shock and speaks about a servant of Lord Voldemort who will return to him. Harry, Ron, and Hermione finally meet up with Sirius Black, who had really escaped Azkaban to go after the real traitor, who had Harry’s parents killed, who was none other than Peter Pettigrew, who was presumed dead by many but had disguised himself as none other than Ron’s pet rat Scabbers for thirteen years.
Sirius Black and Defense Against the Dark Arts, Professor Lupin (another friend of Harry’s father), forced Pettigrew to reveal himself as Harry learned that Black didn’t kill his parents nor worked for Voldemort. Harry tells Black and Lupin to turn in Pettigrew so Black could have his name cleared and Harry can have a new home, away from his bleak living with his evil relatives, the Dursleys. Unfortunately, Lupin (who forgot to take a potion that stops him from becoming a full-fledge werewolf) became a werewolf and Pettigrew escaped as the Dementors almost try to kill Harry, Hermione, and Sirius Black. Hermione and Harry decided to go back in time (with Hermione’s time-turner) to save Black and help him escape with Hagrid’s hippogriff Buckbeak (who was in trouble from the Ministry thanks to Draco Malfoy), much to the fury of Professor Snape, who had been an enemy of Black from their school days.
While Harry was happy that Black had escaped, he was saddened that Lupin had decided to resign, whom he felt was the best DADA teacher ever, while gaining a growing sense of fear over Pettigrew returning to Voldemort. Dumbledore tells Harry something strange about saving Pettigrew’s life, whom Harry felt should’ve been killed, while telling him that his father lives inside him, since Harry did stop the Dementors with a Patronus that looked like a stag. While he still feared over Pettigrew returning to Voldemort, he was cheered up when Sirius sent him a message as Harry was glad to be home, giving the Dursleys, something more to be afraid now that Harry has a convicted murderer for a godfather.
***END SPOILER***
The sense of fear that Harry had attained in the end of The Prisoner of Azkaban does come true in the opening chapter of The Goblet of Fire. Usually, Rowling’s books open up with Harry living in a dismal life with the Dursleys, finding a way to escape from them. Then going back to Hogwarts, finding some strange things happening with some twists and then going back home. Here, J.K. Rowling decides to tamper with the formula a bit more by making The Goblet of Fire a much more ambitious book than any of the previous Harry Potter series with over 700 pages and thirty-seven chapters. In comparison to the previous books, The Goblet of Fire is a more epic story with strange twists, new characters, and a darker story that appears in the later chapters of the book. Here, J.K. Rowling decides to take things to extremes while giving the children’s stories new levels that hadn’t been reached.
The story begins not in the dismal, home of 4 Privet Drive in England. Instead, readers go back fifty years ago when a Muggle named Frank Bryce was accused of murdering people, mysteriously, in a manor called the Riddle House. He was free but fifty years later, Bryce comes to the house where he finds two men talking. One was Peter Pettigrew, who now goes by his nickname Wormtail, and the other was a weak, but sadistic Lord Voldemort. Voldemort and Wormtail discuss plans to kill Harry Potter while using information, they obtained from a witch they had already killed, to plan a plot to restore Voldemort back to power. Bryce tries to escape but Wormtail and Voldemort killed the poor man.
Miles away in Privet Drive, Harry woke up with immense pain on the scar of his forehead as he felt, he just dreamed of Voldemort plotting to kill him. Trying to figure out whom he could talk to about this matter, he decided to write to Sirius, who had flown south and given Harry two letters and a birthday cake, about the scar. Before he could finish the letter, he went to breakfast with the Dursleys who already had problems of their own with their fat, spoiled son Dudley, who was forced to go on a diet with the entire family. Uncle Vernon then receives a letter, tells Harry to go into the living room, which turns out to be an invitation from the Weasleys to go to the Quidditch World Cup. Uncle Vernon wasn’t sure if he could let Harry go, until Harry mentioned Sirius where Vernon gave in and let Harry go to stay with the Weasleys for the remainder of his summer while he wants Harry to contact them to pick him up. For Harry, it would be a great summer as he finished his letter to Sirius and sent his owl Hedwig, to send the letter to Sirius.
Harry waits for the Weasleys to arrive at five but end up showing up late, which Vernon wasn’t impressed by until they do arrive, via chimney. Ron, his troublemaking twin-brothers Fred & George, and dad, Arthur Weasley make a mess out of the Dursleys home as poor Dudley gets something worse than the pig-tail Hagrid gave him prior to Harry’s first year in school. Arthur tries to help Dudley as Harry uses the floo powder to get to the Weasleys’ home. He finally meets the two eldest brothers in the clan, Bill & Charlie, while Arthur arrives furious over what Fred & George did to Dudley. Harry also meets up with Ron’s sister Ginny, his older pompous brother Percy, mother Molly, and friend Hermione Granger. Harry asks Ron & Ginny about Fred & George’s antics which turned out to be joke things they’ve been making while Ron is being annoyed by the new pet owl (Sirius had given him in the last book) Pigwidgeon.
There, the book starts out fun, and innocently as Harry, Hermione, and the Weasleys go to the Quidditch World Cup, which turns out to be fun for the most part, until a group of black-hooded men wearing strange masks decided to torture Muggles until someone cast the Dark Mark (a mark of a skull with snakes coming out, like the Batman signal) where things get into trouble. Harry learns the black-hooded men were called Death Eaters, who were the soldiers of Lord Voldemort and the Dark Mark was Voldemort’s old sign. For Harry, he began to worry as he hoped Sirius had received his letter.
The Goblet of Fire does go back and forth into lighter and darker territories and things get worse when Harry learns of an ancient wizard tournament called the Triwizard Tournament being held in Hogwarts with two rivaling schools, Beauxbatons from France, and Durmstrang from Bulgaria. The tournament was to help bridge the gap between international wizarding schools as The Goblet of Fire selects a champion representing the school. Harry learns that he mysteriously gets selected as a fourth champion where things became troubling and throughout the entire book, things just get worse, particularly in the last seven chapters.
Harry Potter grows a bit more but begins to resent the kind of fame he had gotten since he had always been touted as the boy who defeated Voldemort. He begins to be more annoyed after being selected as a champion that causes some resentment between him and Ron. Ron meanwhile, doesn’t grow up as much since he is upset often over being poor, not having what he wants including the attentions of Beauxbatons champion Fleur Delacour, and gets into more fury with Malfoy, who just loves to make fun of him and his family. Hermione is the one grows up more since she decides to take a stand for the rights of house-elves who work at the Hogwarts kitchen while becomes an object of desire of sorts that sparks some tension between her and Ron (which will probably increase a bit in the next book) as she gets asked to the Yule Ball by the Durmstrang champion and Bulgarian team seeker, Viktor Krum.
Another important character to the story, particularly the tournament is Hogwarts champion Cedric Diggory. While he doesn’t appear much as Harry, Ron, and Hermione, he does bring a sort of innocence that is overlooked to the story and he becomes a rival of sorts for Harry, especially since he has a crush on Cedric’s girlfriend, Cho Chang. Some of the staff do get to stand out, Trelawney becomes funnier in her scenes while she bores the hell out of Ron and Harry while the loathing between Snape and Harry is at its most intense, almost to the point of killing each other, until the end of the book. Hagrid is another character who stands out as he falls in love with the large, Beauxbatons headmistress, Madame Maxime, as we learn how much of a giant he is and the love he often gets from Dumbledore and the Gryffindor students. Dumbledore also provides a sense of morality and guidance in the story as he finally gets to kick some butt, and shows some bitterness around the people who worked for Voldemort that Harry had never seen before.
Sirius Black also returns in a few scenes providing some guidance in the letters including one very important scene where he tells Harry, Ron, and Hermione about the days when Voldemort ruled as well as one of the Triwizard Tournament organizers, Bartemius Crouch Sr., who has some dark secrets he didn’t want to reveal as well as the kind of man he is, particularly since he sacked his house-elf Winky, that made Hermione stand up for the house-elves. Crouch is an individual who seems to be great, and worshiped by Ron’s brother Percy, but in the latter part of the book, you see how his workaholic stance catches up to him.
There are several new characters to the series aside from Madame Maxime and Barty Crouch Sr. There is the mysterious, Durmstrang headmaster Igor Karkaroff, who is upset that Harry is in the tournament, and is a former Death Eater that is hated by those in the Azkaban prison. Another is Ludo Bagman, another tournament organizer, who is likeable but has some secrets of his own as he is often pursued relentlessly by Fred & George Weasley while the new DADA teacher is an old, paranoid wizard named Mad-Eye Moody. Moody is easily one of the coolest characters that teach the students all these dark spells (including the Killing Curse “Avada Kedavra” that was only survived by Harry) while giving Draco Malfoy a lesson in humility but there too is something strange about Moody. Another character, that is very unlikable is a woman named Rita Skeeter, a tabloid witch reporter, who loves to damage the reputations of many people including Arthur Weasley and Hagrid. Hermione goes to war against Skeeter as she tries to find some dirt on Hermione as well. Skeeter is that great example of tabloid reporters, even when she tries to destroy Harry’s fame, just as he was gaining some understanding towards it.
With all the new characters providing a sense of darkness or hilarity to The Goblet of Fire, there are some old characters that get more development in the story. One old character that returns is Dobby, the Malfoys’ former house-elf, who reveals a sense of happiness on freedom while he tries to persuade the house-elves into the idea of wearing clothes and getting paid (which might dawn on them in the next book). Then, there’s Harry’s clumsy, forgetful Gryffindor classmate Neville Longbottom. Now we always known Neville is a kid, who rarely triumphs in a few things, and always have a hard time doing things right but ends up screwing up. On The Goblet of Fire, we don’t learn why he got selected into the Gryffindor house by the Sorting Hat, yet we finally learn why he lives with his grandmother and what was revealed is very shocking and you just hope in The Order of the Phoenix, he finally triumphs on something.
Now the first thirty chapters are filled with some dark overtones as well as a few jokes inside and stories of affection, dances and all of this stuff. In those chapters, there is something for everyone who loved the Potter stories just as the book slowly sets up something very dark. The last seven chapters are the most important part of the book since things get darker, someone dies in the book, and authority figures and everything else screw things up as relationships begin to fall apart. By the end of the book, you’re not really sure who to trust and who’s on who’s side which sets up something great for book five as who is loyal to Voldemort, who will sellout who. Really, The Goblet of Fire does leave the readers wanting for answers and J.K. doesn’t provide them yet until June 21, 2003.
While Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire is not as good as the emotional-driven The Prisoner of Azkaban, it is still one amazing book from J.K. Rowling. The ambitiousness might turn off some but it didn’t stop from The Goblet of Fire becoming a worldwide seller. Easily, The Goblet of Fire is one book that leaves you wanting for more and it is certainly a good build-up for The Order of the Phoenix. Of course, it is best to read the series in chronological order to understand everything concerning Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire provides readers to go back to the previous series to look over minor characters and stories as well. In the end, The Goblet of Fire is another rewarding treasure to J.K. Rowling’s brilliant Harry Potter series, as we wait for his return in Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix.
General Juvenile / Children's Fiction - Harry Potter is midway through his training as a wizard and his coming of age. Harry wants to get away from th...More at Barnes and Noble
Harry Potter is midway through his training as a wizard and his coming of age. Harry wants to get away from the pernicious Dursleys and go to the Inte...More at HotBookSale
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