Prof Atlas has given me the honor of teaching this months lesson. I will be grading it and all those things, it will be a bit different than what you have studied so far.

This one will be a bit fun and exciting for you and hopefully it will help you all understand how the books were developed.

This month is all about Descriptive and Imaginative words...

When you read the Harry Potter books, you may have notice that you formed images in your head of what Hogwarts looks like, or even the characters. J.K.Rowling uses a technique that is called descriptive or imagivinative technique.

What is a descriptive, you ask?
1. Involving or characterized by description; serving to describe.
2. Grammar.
a. Expressing an attribute of the modified noun, as green in green grass. Used of an adjective or adjectival clause.

{This came from www.dictionary.com}

In other words, it is used to describe such things in more details.
Let's take this as an example…

A House: This is not descriptive because it does not say what type of house or describing the house.
A big, red house: This one is of course a descriptive word because it is explaining what a house looks like; because it used the term big and red and with this you can imagine what the house would look like.

This is what J. K. Rowling used in the Harry Potter books; she describes every thing in more detail and more specific information. Why does she do this, she does it to create images or picture in our head of what certain things look like. Let's look at the following passage for an example…

“Standing in the doorway, illuminated by the shivering flames in Lupin's hand, was a cloaked figure that towered to the ceiling. Its face was completely hidden beneath its hood. Harry's eyes darted downward, and what he saw made his stomach contract. There was a hand protruding from the cloak and it was glistening, grayish, slimy-looking, and scabbed, like something dead that had decayed in water...
But it was visible only for a split second. As though the creature beneath the cloak sensed Harry's gaze, the hand was suddenly withdrawn into the folds of its black cloak.
And then the thing beneath the hood, whatever it was, drew a long, slow, rattling breath, as though it were trying to suck something more than air from its surroundings.”

This was taken from Prisoner of Azkaban (Book 3) Chapter 5 (Dementors), and this is a perfect example of the use of descriptive and imagery words. When you read this paragraph, you get a sense of ideas or images, of what these creatures look like, because J. K. Rowling used words such as “glistening, grayish, slimy-looking and scabbed” to describe or create an image of the Dementor’s hand.

As we know, J. K. Rowling takes a long time to type out the novel because she wants it to be perfect, but she also takes her time so she can create some images using descriptive words, so that we can see it in our head and this helps us to fully understand the novel.

She uses these techniques in a variety of things like Characters and conversations, Creatures, Hogwarts (Buildings or rooms) and it’s surrounding as well as in sports, such as quidditch. These are some example of where she would use this techniques. In other words she does it on every page of the novel.

Assignment:

1. In your own words, what does the word descriptive mean and give an example. (5)

2. In the paragraph given (The one describing the dementors), name 5 descriptive words that were used in that passage. (5)

3. Using your Harry Potter books, find a paragraph that has descriptive words, and then tell me what the descriptive words are. (5+5)

4. Given the picture below of the Dementors, would you say that is what you had imagined the Dementors to look after reading abotu them, or was it diffrent? Tell my why and provide evidence if possible to back up your point. (5)



5. In your own words, (without using the HP books if possible) how would you describe Draco Malfoy? (5)

Extra Credit

Extra Credit (20 Points)
Have a little bit of fun in here and make sure you use the descriptive techniques in here to qualify for up to 20 points.
J. K. Rowling has put out a competition (not real ;)) for people to create a new character for the 6th book, and your task is to create a profile (in a paragraph) about this character. Tell us all about him/her and describe this new character… (Note that it can’t be you or anyone at HOL, try and make up the name)… Put as much information and descriptive/imagery words as you can!!!

All the assignment and extra credit must be sent to holpta@hotmail.com

You must include your name, ID and your house.
If you did not include any of this i will email you back with this information and I will also confirm whos email I have recieved...

Any questions, queries can be sent via pm or email